ISLAMABAD: Qatar Charity has distributed emergency relief aid, including food baskets, hygiene kits and medical camps, in flood-affected communities in Pakistan, it said on Wednesday, after deluges killed more than 1,000 people.
The floods, triggered by heavy monsoon rains and India’s release of excess water, have killed 1,006 people in Pakistan since Jun. 26 and submerged vast tracts of land, mainly in Punjab province where over 4 million people have been affected.
The government of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif is still assessing the damages from the latest deluges, which come just three years after the 2022 floods that inundated a third of the country, affected 33 million people, and caused an estimates loss of $30 billion.
Qatar Charity, which aims to provide support for vulnerable communities through robust social welfare systems, has organized free medical camps, distributed 500 hygiene kits and delivered 2,500 dry food baskets to the flood-affected Pakistanis as part of its aim to support vulnerable communities internationally.
“Since late June, Qatar Charity has been actively engaged in addressing the devastating impacts of the ongoing monsoon floods in Swat, Shangla, in KP and Jhang, Muzaffargarh in Punjab,” it said.
“Qatar Charity rapidly activated its emergency response across affected and at-risk areas, working with provincial governments, disaster management authorities, UNICEF and communities to deliver life-saving assistance in food security, health, nutrition, and WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene).”
It said the response prioritized life-saving community needs while strengthening coordination and information management for effective multi-sectoral action.
The floods have damaged 12,569 homes, 1,981 kilometers of roads and washed away 6,509 livestock, besides inundating standing crops on hundreds of thousands of acres of land.
“With floodwater everywhere, we had no access to roads or food. My children were crying in hunger,” Shahnaz Bibi, 38, whose home and livestock were destroyed, was quoted as saying by the charity. “The Qatar Charity team delivered a food package to my doorstep. This is truly a blessing from Allah.”
Shakir Ullah, another 40-year-old beneficiary, shared that he lost four of his relatives to the recent floods.
“My home was destroyed, and I am now staying at a relative’s house with no income and no access to roads,” he said. “Qatar Charity reached out to me and provided a food pack that will sustain me for more than a month.”
The charity’s Rapid Needs Assessment (RNA), in collaboration with United Nations agencies and other stakeholders, identified in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa over 1.57 million people affected with critical gaps in nutrition, education, and WASH services, while in Punjab, it identified 4.2 million people affected and 2.8 million displaced in the 18 targeted districts, according to the charity.
It said it had managed to conduct free general medical screening camps in Punjab’s Jhang and Muzaffargarh and reached about 22,000 people, while it reached about 30,000 people through free eye medical screening camps in the two districts.
Additional, Qatar Charity, it will sign an agreement to End Child Wasting, Nutrition Prevention, Promotion and Management Intervention in four flood-affected districts of Punjab.
