Cambodia’s Flood Woes Overshadowed by Those of Wealthier Neighbor

November 2, 2011
By THOMAS FULLER
The New York Times

“The government can only help a small number of people — they don’t have the capacity”

BATTAMBANG, Cambodia — The high water is devastating even for a country inured to monsoon rains and waterlogged rice fields: wide swaths of Cambodia’s countryside have become giant lakes, with villagers and livestock marooned on scattered patches of dry land.

The floods that have affected three-quarters of the country, by the United Nations’ reckoning, have been overshadowed by similar troubles in its larger and wealthier neighbor, Thailand, where the government is scrambling to protect central Bangkok from inundation.

Here in Cambodia, though, aid workers describe a more Darwinian struggle, and a generally higher degree of desperation among villagers.

“This is the worst I’ve seen in my career,” said Soen Seueng, a 58-year-old doctor who tended to a long line of flood victims on Wednesday, most of them women and children, who were camped on a strip of raised land accessible only by boat.

Cambodia floods bring mounting disease toll

A young girl with dengue fever during recent floods in Cambodia. Photograph: John Macgregor/cwars.org

Thousands of people have been left stranded in dire conditions by the heavy monsoon rains that have caused devastation around south-east Asia

Tuesday 1 November 2011

Mark Tran

guardian.co.uk

Thousands of people are encamped with their farm animals on tiny strips of land surrounded by floodwaters in Battambang province in northwestern Cambodia.

John Macgregor, an aid worker who has been accompanying teams delivering food and water to Battambang, described the area as a vast inland sea where conditions are dire and malnutrition is common.

"Diseases are becoming more common and yesterday our doctors diagnosed the first cases of cholera. People are sleeping in extended family groups on rush mats which sit on the mud, under strips of clear plastic. Ducks, chickens, dogs and cats are often in there with people - a factor in the mounting disease toll," said Macgregor, communications director of Cambodian War Amputees Rehabilitation Society (CWARS) from Phom Penh, the Cambodian capital.

Boil Your Water, Doctor Tells 'Hello VOA'

Nuch Sarita, VOA Khmer
Washington
07/06/2007

Dr. Lor Kim Song, a tropical disease specialist in Paris, told 'Hello VOA' listeners Thursday the best way to prevent water-borne diseases was to boil water. Period.

Many of those diseases are easily prevented through the simple act of boiling water, Lor Kim Song said, though callers asked if it was possible to find another solution.

Chemical treatments were expensive compared to boiling, the doctor said, citing bacteria that cause cholera, parasites that cause dysentery and viruses that cause other illnesses as reasons to boil.

One caller asked how healthy coffee was. The doctor said that as a stimulant coffee can be habit forming. But three cups a day fine.

A woman from Kampong Cham asked if fountain water in Phnom Penh was dangerous. Lor Kim Song said the fountain should have chlorine in it and was therefore safe.

A final caller, from Siem Reap, asked why IVs are given to small children. Children with diarrhea can lose a lot of water, the doctor said, and a dehydrated child can die quickly.