Canada’s DART team arrives in Pakistan
Female medical professionals needed Death toll climbs to at least 54,000
ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN—
Stepping off the gunmetal grey Canadian military Airbus and walking into the customs area at Chaklala Air Base, army Lieut. Atif Butt picked up his rucksack, adjusted his medical armband and grinned. The 27- year-old health-care technician was coming closer to what his superiors warned would be “unspeakable horrors.” Yet Butt wasn’t worried.
“ This is the chance of a lifetime for me to serve my two countries — my birth country of Pakistan and my home country of Canada,” said Butt, the son of a Hamilton, Ont., cab driver who moved to Canada in 1987.
After a 22- hour delay at a secret Canadian military base in the Middle East, which came after refuelling stops in England and Croatia, Butt and 143 other members of Canada’s Disaster Assistance and Response Team ( DART) finally arrived last night in earthquake-stricken Pakistan. And already they’re calling for reinforcements. DART needs more women medical professionals to treat female victims among the thousands injured in the Oct. 8 earthquake.
In many conservative areas of rural Pakistan, it is taboo for women patients to be treated by male medical professionals. DART’s 16 frontline medical technicians include eight women, but the team has only one female nurse and no women doctors.
“ When we started hearing reports that women were going without care, ( we) started a staff check to see how many more female medical professionals we could source,” said Maj. Julia Atherley-Blight, deputy commander of the mission.
Six additional female medical personnel are leaving Canada this week to join DART in Pakistan. The army says it will likely look for more.
Pakistani authorities estimate that some 54,000 people were killed in the 7.6- magnitude quake, which injured more than 80,000. The United Nations says about 3.3 million people were left homeless.
After briefings today in Islamabad, the Canadian troops are expected to begin navigating hairpin turns and traffic jams on the road to Garidupata, a small town in mountainous Kashmir, where DART will set up its main camp and medical unit staffed with doctors, nurses and technicians.
Hard-hit Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistani- controlled Kashmir about 20 kilometres to the northwest, has become a relief distribution hub for quake survivors.
Pakistani and U. S. military helicopters were delivering aid there yesterday, but the U.N. World Food Program warned that 500,000 earthquake survivors have yet to receive supplies.
“ People don’t just need food. First of all they need shelter, blankets and medical assistance — then food and clean water,” said James Morris, executive director of the WFP. The Canadians will set up a camp in Muzaffarabad with three water purification systems, that can produce a total of 150,000 litres of fresh water a day.
Relief workers visited one village where an 8- year-old girl died yesterday of abdominal injuries they said could easily have been treated a short helicopter ride away. The death highlighted the predicament facing thousands of injured stranded in the mountains, many with infections that could turn deadly unless they get medical treatment.
“ The situation is really disastrous,” said Turkish relief worker Tayyar Wardar, a member of an emergency medical team that flew to Sarli Sachan, the area where the girl died. “They had no medicine, or food. Nobody had been there until now.” Wardar said some villagers walked more than a day to get help in Muzaffarabad. Aid workers reached Sarli Sachan in just 10 minutes by helicopter and found 40 people with lifethreatening injuries, he said.
Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf suggested letting
Kashmiris cross the
so- called Line of Control in Kashmir, a move
that would encourage
co-operation between
the two neighbours in
the disputed region.
Kashmir is divided between Pakistan and India, and both nations claim it in its entirety.
India, which has sent quake relief supplies to Pakistan, hailed Musharraf’s proposal but said it was awaiting more details before deciding whether to accept it.
Musharraf also appealed to the world for more tents to shelter homeless people, and Islamabad banned the export of locally made tents to boost supplies to the earthquake zone with winter looming. Between 20,000 and 30,000 tents have been distributed to quake victims, but Pakistan needs as many as 200,000 tents and it will take two to three weeks to get them for everyone, Musharraf said.
“ We have to beat the winter,” he said. The Canadian camp, which will boast a medical clinic and blood lab that could test for TB and other diseases, should be ready to begin accepting patients this weekend.
While DART is on a mission of mercy, the team might not be well received by everyone, said Maj. Kevin Rowcliffe, DART’s top security officer.
Rowcliffe, fresh off an assignment with Canadian forces in Kandahar, Afghanistan, said it’s possible Canada’s humanitarian force might be a terrorist target. Islamic extremists are known to operate in Pakistan’s northern regions, close to where DART will establish its base.
“ Terrorists are very well aware that Canadians in Afghanistan are going out and killing terrorists,” Rowcliffe said. “ We have to be aware that they are not happy about what we are doing to them in Afghanistan.”