Heavy snow destroys Pak tent village, 70 injured

Cold-related diseases on the rise as certain high-altitude areas are yet to receive sufficient aid.

At least 70 people were injured when heavy snowfall destroyed a tent village set up for earthquake survivors in Pakistan.

HT Image

Urdu newspaper

Jang

reported that a field hospital and many tent schools had collapsed in Hattia Bala area due to incessant snow and rains that began late on Saturday evening.

Reports from quake-hit northern Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir said that landslides triggered by rains and snowfall blocked many roads and adversely affected relief operations.

A health official in Kashmir's capital Muzaffarabad said that the weather has raised the number of cold-related cases, including pneumonia and upper and lower respiratory tract infections.

Some relief organisations said people living in villages over 5,000 feet of altitude had not received sufficient aid, which might cause more deaths because of the cold.

"We are concerned about people on high altitude as many of them have not gotten anything yet," said Farhana Stocker of Oxfam.

According to Pakistan's meteorological department, more than four feet of snow was recorded on high-altitude areas devastated by last year's tremors.