INDONESIA: SUMATRA FLOOD VICTIMS FALLING ILL

Disaster victims are beginning to suffer from diseases and a lack of clean water and food a week after floods and landslides first hit Aceh and North Sumatra, officials say. Rescue workers are continuing to struggle to provide aid and shelter for thousands of people displaced by the disasters, which killed at least 109 people in the two provinces.

Rescue workers continued to struggle Wednesday to provide aid and shelter for thousands of people displaced by the disasters, which have killed at least 109 people in the two provinces.

Indonesian Red Cross volunteer Iqbal said flood victims were turning up sick, hungry and dehydrated and were eating anything they could find.

"We tried to get through to Simpang Kiri village in Kejuruan Muda district by boat on Tuesday and saw many victims had started to eat the internal fronds of banana trees," Iqbal said.

Diseases in people the organisation treated ranged from skin rashes to respiratory illnesses and high fevers, he said.

In Aceh, 69 people have died in the floods. Eleven bodies were found in North Sumatra's badly hit Langkat district and 29 others were evacuated from a landslide in Mandailing Natal.

Indonesia's president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono was upset by conflicting media reports on the scale of the disaster, which he said would only confuse relatives of disaster victims, detiknews.com reported. Yudhoyono urged officials to prioritise repairing communications infrastructure in disaster-hit areas.

from ADNKronos International