Pakistan flood toll rises with 25 children among 57 more deaths

SMA NEWS – KARACHI
The toll from cataclysmic floods in Pakistan continued to climb on Saturday with 57 more deaths, 25 of them children, as the country grapples with a relief and rescue operation of near unprecedented scale.
A high-level body set up to coordinate the relief effort met in Islamabad on Saturday for the first time, chaired by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, to take stock of the disaster.
Record monsoon rains and melting glaciers in northern mountains brought floods that have affected 33 million people and killed at least 1,265 people, including 441 children. The inundation, blamed on climate change, is still spreading.
The proportion of children’s deaths has raised concern. On Friday, the United Nations children’s agency (UNICEF) said there was a risk of “many more” child deaths from disease after floods.
The floods that have inundated a third of the country were preceded by four heatwaves and multiple raging forest fires, the disaster management chief told the high-level meeting, highlighting the effects of climate change in the South Asian nation.