LEGAZPI CITY: The provincial government of Albay needs national aid to support about 40,000 people living temporarily in crowded evacuation camps as Mayon volcano continue show sign of possible major eruption as it spew lava since Sunday.
Cedric Daep, chief of Albay Public Safety Emergency Management Office (Apsemo) said the province lacks money to support the needs of evacuees.
“We’re conducting series of meeting and preparations to support the displaced families unfortunately there are no sufficient budget. We need the intervention of national government,” Daep said.
Currently the number of evacuees ballooned to 9,361 families or about 40,000 people housed in various evacuation camps of three cities and five towns of Albay.
The Sangguniang Panlalawigan on Tuesday declared Albay under the state of calamity allowing the use of five percent calamity fund to assist affected families.
The cities of Albay, Legazpi, Tabaco and Ligao and the towns of Camalig, Guinobatan, Daraga, Santo Domingo and Malilipot were affected by Mayon volcano restiveness.
On Tuesday morning, a pyroclastic flow tumbled in Miisi gully in Daraga town but alert level 3 status of Mayon remains despite the pyroclastic flow.
Gov. Al Francis Bichara has ordered the towns of Camalig and Guinobatan including the Ligao City to conduct localized suspension of classes in all levels in the event of moderate to heavy ashfall.
An evacuee from Barangay Buang in Tabaco City died of stroke at Mayon Elementary School evacuation camp. But Daep said Presia is indirect casualty of Mayon restive activity.
Sanitation
Dante Baclao, provincial engineer of Albay said that based on their monitoring of evacuation camps, water and sanitation including clogged toilets are the pressing issues that need to be addressed immediately to prevent diseases at the evacuation camps.
The provincial health office has provided water rationing in areas with bigger number of evacuees.
Overcrowded
Meanwhile, evacuees in Bagumbayan Elementary School in Legazpi City are packed like sardines where one classroom housed at least 31 to 35 families or about 222 individual which alarmed Mayor Noel Rosal fearing the situation can trigger diseases.
Rosal ordered the decongestion of evacuees in the school to prevent the spread of diseases assigning to house 10 families per classroom to ease the burden of the fleeing residents.
Merlinda Esplana, of Barangay Buyuan and team leader or room 20, said some of the evacuees were sleeping on the chairs as they give preference to the elderly and children.
They were the biggest number of evacuees with 851 families or 3,508 persons in Bagumbayan school where 30 classrooms were used as temporary shelters aside from evacuation building built by the city government.
The city government enforced the pre-empted evacuation of residents living within the seven-kilometer permanent danger zone (PDZ) in the villages of Padang, Buyuan, Mabinit, Matanag and Bonga.
The evacuees from Barangay Padang were about 111 families or 300 persons, Barangay Mabinit – 414 or 1,596 people, Barangay Matanag – 437 families or 2,322 persons housed in Albay Central School and Barangay Bonga with 797 families or 3,495 people.
Legazpi City has the highest number of evacuees with 2,610 families or 11,522 people, and expected to increase once the state weather bureau raises the alert level of Mayon volcano to level 4 or 5 in case a full-blown eruption takes place.
Rosal also told the city social welfare and city health officers to isolate evacuees with diseases specifically with tuberculosis and other contagious diseases here.
He said the city government can support the evacuees for at least 10 more days.
The provincial health office (PHO) in Albay reported that there are 113 cases of illnesses affecting the evacuees mostly children such as cough and cold, fever and chickenpox.
To prevent the spread of disease in the evacuation camps public health chief Antonio Ludevice of the provincial health office said they set up health stations to attend the needs of the evacuees in three cities and five municipalities here.
The evacuees afflicted with chickenpox were sent to Josefina Duran Memorial Hospital for treatment.