Islamabad, Apr 22 (EFE).- Unicef on Monday warned that children in Pakistan were at extremely high risk due to torrential rain that wreaked havoc in several provinces of the Asian country, leaving at least 74 people dead.
“Year on year, children in Pakistan are caught in a vicious cycle of drought and floods” and are at “extremely high risk” of the impacts of the climate crisis,” said Abdullah Fadil, the representative of the United Nations agency in the country.
According to the latest data, 15 people died and 10 were injured in the southern Balochistan province due to rain and lightning that began a week ago.
The province’s disaster management authorities were expecting the rain to continue for the next two days, the UN agency added.
In the northern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, the death toll rose to 59 on Saturday, according to the disaster management authority.
“It is a reminder of the devastating tragedy in 2022, when 500 children lost their lives (…) in southern Sindh. I saw firsthand how children were malnourished and the little they had swept away, including their schools and their hopes and futures,” said Fadil.
Pakistan is one of the 10 countries that are most vulnerable to climate change.
Rains cause substantial damage in the country, especially during the monsoon period as well as in winter in areas where infrastructure is weak and mud houses predominate.
In March, some 53 people, including 30 children, died and another 65 were injured by heavy rainfall in parts of the country that led authorities to evacuate thousands of people.
At least 1,700 people died in Pakistan in 2022 during devastating floods, which also displaced 8 million people and affected a total of 33 million, a seventh of the population of the world’s fifth most populated country. EFE
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