Copyright scmp
Jamaica plans to set up field hospitals in five western parishes after Hurricane Melissa caused extensive damage to health facilities, Health Minister Christopher Tufton has said. Local media reports from Friday quote Tufton as saying that additional support was needed for doctors and nurses, many of whom were already stretched to the limit. Power and water services remain disrupted across many areas due to damaged infrastructure and fuel stations in the west of the country have reported low or no supplies, Transport Minister Daryl Vaz said. Authorities, with support from international partners and organisations, are working to accelerate clean-up operations and distribute humanitarian aid quickly. Jamaican medical associations urged doctors to volunteer at the hospital in Black River, a heavily affected southern community, to relieve colleagues who had been working continuously in the damaged facility for days, the Nationwide portal reported. At least 50 people were killed by Hurricane Melissa in the Caribbean, including 19 in Jamaica, and many more were injured or remain missing. Melissa swept across Jamaica as a Category 5 hurricane on Tuesday. The US Hurricane Centre described it as one of the strongest hurricanes ever recorded in the Atlantic. By Saturday, Melissa was no longer classified as a hurricane over the Atlantic, the centre said. Waist deep floodwaters In Cuba, authorities worked round the clock on Friday to rescue residents still stranded by unprecedented floodwaters in the wake of Melissa, which slammed into the country as a dangerous Category 3 hurricane. Emergency workers waded waist deep in wetsuits and used boats and military vehicles to rescue residents after the country’s longest river, Rio Cauto, overflowed its banks. The floodwaters had cut off a principal route connecting the capital Havana in western Cuba with the eastern cities of Santiago, Bayamo and Guantanamo, forcing motorists and rescuers to seek alternate routes to the north. Rio Cauto resident Eduardo Verdecia, 83, said he and his family had expected the river to subside but continuing rains, plus run-off from nearby mountains and a fast-rising reservoir had surprised them. “When night fell we thought it would go down, but look at it now, and it’s still raining,” Verdecia said, indicating chocolate waters that had inundated his house to near roof level. “We’ve had floods before but nothing like this. My house had never flooded.” Cuba has reported no deaths from Melissa. Recovery from the severe flooding to infrastructure and crop damage will be complicated by a dire economic crisis that has already led to shortages of food, fuel and medicine across the island. The US State Department said on Thursday it was ready to offer to help those affected by the hurricane in Cuba – a close neighbour but long-time foe of the United States. Cuba’s deputy director of US affairs Johana Tablada said on Friday that the administration of President Donald Trump had not yet followed up with details. “The US has not made any concrete offers, nor has it responded to the questions we raised regarding the announcement made by the secretary of state,” Tablada told reporters in Havana. Additional reporting by Reuters
