Central Visayas tops list of casualties, public infra damage due to ‘Odette’
CENTRAL Visayas has topped the list of regions in the country with reported casualties due to Typhoon Odette (Rai), according to the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC).
The region also sustained the most damage to public infrastructure, the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) said.
As of 8 a.m. Thursday, Dec. 30, 2021, the NDRRMC listed 1,627 reported casualties nationwide, broken down into 397 dead, 1,147 injured and 83 missing.
Central Visayas topped the list in all these categories.
Of the 397 reported deaths, 220 were reported in Central Visayas, followed by 71 in Caraga, 47 in Western Visayas, 30 in Eastern Visayas, 22 in Mimaropa and seven in Northern Mindanao, the NDRRMC said.
Of the 1,147 injured, Central Visayas also led with 562 reported injured, followed by 508 in Caraga, 59 in Western Visayas, 16 in Northern Mindanao, two in Mimaropa and none in Eastern Visayas.
In terms of the number of missing reported, Central Visayas again accounted for the bulk of the 83 reported missing, with 32; followed by Western Visayas with 31; Mimaropa, nine; Eastern Visayas, six; Caraga, five; and Northern Mindanao, none.
The council said the reports were still for validation, however.
Central Visayas groups Cebu, Bohol, Negros Oriental and Siquijor.
Infrastructure damage
In a statement released Thursday, the DPWH said Central Visayas also sustained the most damage to public infrastructure, accounting for nearly half of the damage.
DPWH Secretary Roger Mercado said damage to public infrastructure was now at P3.71 billion, with Central Visayas accounting for P1.68 billion of the damage, followed by Eastern Visayas at P963.64 million, Western Visayas at P549.65 million, Caraga at P230 million, Mimaropa at P157.83 million and Northern Mindanao at P134.34 million.
Of the P3.71 billion damage to public infrastructure, P2.87 billion was in damage to roads, P602.48 million in bridges, P349.26 million in flood-control structures and P650,000 in other public buildings, the agency said.
In terms of roads reported as not passable due to Odette, Central Visayas also topped the list.
Of 236 roads reported as not passable after the storm, 72 were in Central Visayas, 55 in Eastern Visayas, 43 in Western Visayas, 26 in Northern Mindanao, 21 in Caraga and 19 in Mimaropa, according to the NDRRMC.
However, as of its Dec. 30 report, only 11 of these roads remained not passable: eight in Central Visayas, and one each in Mimaropa, Northern Mindanao and Caraga.
Homes destroyed
Typhoon Odette, which made landfall in the Philippines on Dec. 16, 2021, moving on to Western Visayas the next day, affected 6,071,790 persons nationwide, according to the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) in its Dec. 29, 2021 report.
The storm damaged 630,732 houses, 200,117 of them totally and 430,615 of them partially, the DSWD reported.
The social welfare agency also said P207.38 million in assistance had been provided so far by the DSWD, local government units (LGUs), non-government organizations and others.
Separately, the DSWD Central Visayas (DSWD 7) said that under its “Odette Relief Augmentation to LGUs,” it had provided P47.49 million worth of relief assistance to typhoon survivors in the region as of Dec. 28.
This, after it provided 86,452 family food packs worth P45.32 million and 1,712 hygiene kits worth P2.17 million to LGUs in Cebu, Bohol and Negros Oriental.
The family food packs were divided thus: 29,998 packs to Cebu (worth P15,869,751), 29,122 to Bohol (worth P15,000,819), and 27,332 to Negros Oriental (worth 14,452,968).
The DSWD 7 did not detail how the hygiene kits were distributed. (CTL)
