The tragedy of the earthquake has not reduced the hermeticism of the Military Board that holds power in much of Myanmar, which has denied access to the country to the foreign press to cover the catastrophe. The Chief of the Board, Min Aung Hlaing, justified on Sunday the decision with the argument that there are difficulties in finding accommodation, in addition to the electricity and water supply, according to EFE. Meanwhile, the official death figure continues to increase. There are already 2,000, according to the data of the Board and the opposition.
“Before the earthquake there were almost 20 million people in need of humanitarian aid in Myanmar,” said the UN humanitarian coordinator for Myanmar, Marcoluigi Corsi today. The UN points out that the magnitude of the disaster “still is clear”, but that the damage is “vast.” The hospitals of the affected regions are overwhelmed, and the communication and transport routes have been severely affected, points out.
At least three important bridges collapsed on Friday and dozens of roads were practically impassable by the earthquake, which has cut key communication routes to move help. This delayed the arrival of rescuers on Friday night and the weekend.
To this is added the closure of at least two airports, including that of the capital, Naipyidó, which has closed commercial operations and now maintains strict control of arrivals under express authorization from the Military Board, and Mandalay, the second largest city in the country.
Any deployment within Burma is affected by previous problems that were intensified in the last 72 hours, such as electrical failures, the unstable Internet connection and the shortage of fuel.
The context of war does not help the assistance to where it is needed quickly. The Military Board, which gave a coup in 2021 to end the democratic parenthesis in the country, controls only a part of the territory –A BBC study At the end of 2024, it estimated that only 21% – while the rest are disputed by different factions in which the prodemocratic vocation and the ethnic statement have variable weights. The National Unity Government (NUG), which brings together several of the opposition groups, points out, in that sense, that military bombings continue despite the natural tragedy.
Abundant in the double condition of a country at war and beaten by the catastrophe of Myanmar, the General Coordinator of Physicians Without Borders (MSF) in the country, Federica Franco, has described the situation of “tragedy within a tragedy”, in statements sent to the press by the NGO. “The immediate emergency is undoubtedly the urgent need to assist people with traumatic lesions, with fractures and wounds due to crushing caused by the collapse of buildings,” he said.
“It is essential to intervene in the first 72 hours with surgical and traumatological attention to be able to save lives and also limit the risk of subsequent complications […] In the next few days, we fear that the health situation worsens even more due to the destruction of medical facilities, the shortage of drinking water and also the precarious hygienic conditions in many cities. This could cause epidemics of water transmitted diseases, such as diarrhea or cholera, but also malaria and dengue, ”he has alerted.
The tremor of magnitude 7.7 occurred on Friday at 12.50 h in the northwest of Myanmar, – the 7.20 h in Spain -, 10 kilometers deep and with the epicenter between the cities of Sagaing and Mandalay, about 17 kilometers from that last city, the second largest city in the country. Just 11 minutes after the first earthquake there was a replica of magnitude 6.4 in the same area, followed by others during the weekend. The earthquake also affected Thailand, where at least 18 people died.
A statistical model prepared by the US Geological Servicecited by the New York Times, already He anticipated Friday that it was very likely that the total victims exceed 1,000 people, or be even much higher.
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