‘Children’s lives in danger’

PAPUA NEW GUINEA – More than a quarter of a million people remain in need of urgent assistance almost a month after a large earthquake devastated the Papua New Guinea highlands.

The 7.5 magnitude quake hit on February 26, followed by another two earthquakes and more than 100 aftershocks.

It killed more than 145, displaced more than 34,000 and overall affected more than 544,000 people.

The PNG government estimates about 270,000 people, including more than 125,000 children, are in urgent need of assistance. About 143,000 are food insecure. Just 1300 households have received emergency shelter.

Getting to the remote villages and communities remains difficult after landslides cut many off from road access.

“Children’s lives are in danger,” said Karen Allen, the Unicef representative for PNG.

“With limited access to basic necessities, families are struggling to survive in crowded shelters, or to rebuild homes and food gardens.”

Unicef estimated it needed at least $17 million to provide humanitarian assistance over the next nine months.

This week it delivered 23 metric tonnes of aid, including shelters, water purification tablets, hygiene kits, blankets and learning kits.

There are 24 organisations and companies providing relief or assistance.

Noreen Chambers, a Unicef worker in the Highlands, said Unicef was concentrating on health, water and sanitation efforts.

“We’re also working in child protection, setting up safe spaces to provide psychosocial care to children and women and men affected by the earthquake,” she told Guardian Australia.

Chambers said that as recently as last week there were at least 600 people living under one shelter at a Mendi emergency care centre – the only one Unicef was able to access by road.

The crowded centres meant there was a risk of communicable disease outbreaks.

Damage in some of the four devastated provinces is so bad schools may not re-open for the rest of the year, prompting warnings from aid workers that an entire generation of Papua New Guinean children risk missing out on a proper education.

- PNC sources