Deaths may increase 8 times, WHO’s dire forecast after Turkey-Syria earthquake

Copenhagen, Denmark:

The death toll from Monday’s massive earthquake in Turkey and Syria is likely to rise well above the provisional number of more than 2,600, according to World Health Organization forecasts.

“There remains the potential for further falls, so we often see in the order of an eightfold increase in the initial numbers,” Catherine Smallwood, the WHO’s senior emergency officer for Europe, told AFP.

“Unfortunately, we always see the same thing with earthquakes, which is that the initial reports of the number of people killed or injured will increase significantly in the coming weeks,” Smallwood said.

Since the 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck at 04:17 a.m. (0117 GMT) on Monday at a depth of about 18 kilometers (11 miles) near the Turkish city of Gaziantep, which is about 60 kilometers from the Syrian border, the count has risen sharply, Close to 2,700 by evening, as rescuers struggled to locate thousands of survivors trapped under the rubble of collapsed buildings.

Mid-winter temperatures and blizzard conditions made rescue extra difficult and put survivors without shelter at risk.

“For other people who cannot go back to their homes, they will meet and gather in mass environments. And this will also pose special risks if they are not well taken care of, if there is no heating, but overcrowding Because of that too,” Smallwood said.

One such risk would be the circulation of respiratory viruses, she explained.

Turkey is located in one of the world’s most active seismic zones, where Monday’s quake struck along the East Anatolian Fault as well as the North Anatolian Fault Line earthquake across the country that killed more than 17,000 people in 1999.

Seismologist Tine Larsen of the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland told AFP that Monday’s tremor was felt as far away as Greenland.

She said that, within minutes, the tremor was felt along the east coast of Greenland, as were several aftershocks.

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