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Official Yolanda death toll breaches 4k mark, with 1,602 missing


(Updated 3:59 p.m.) The death toll from super typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) breached the 4,000 mark early Wednesday, even as the number of people affected neared 10 million, the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council said.

Since the first weekend after the storm, the global media has latched on to the 10,000 death estimate in its headlines. But the official government figure, based on actual body counts, is still less than half of that. However, it continues to rise, as bodies are recovered from debris or are washed up on shore.

In its 6 a.m. update, the NDRRMC said the number of fatalities stood at 4,011, with 18,557 injured and 1,602 still missing.

Many of the missing could eventually be counted among the dead.

Region 8 police director Chief Superintendent Elmer Soria, the police official who first gave the media the 10,000 death estimate, was sacked from office, with a Philippine National Police official saying he needed to be debriefed because of stress brought by Yolanda. President Benigno Aquino III insisted on a much lower fatality figure.

Aquino's estimate was 2,000 to 2,500.

"Ten thousand, I think, is too much," Aquino told CNN in an interview. "There was emotional drama involved with that particular estimate."

The death toll stood at 2,360 on the morning of Friday, Nov. 15 then rose to 3,621 by the afternoon, surpassing Aquino's estimate, after reports from Western Visayas came in. 

On Nov. 9, a day after Yolanda hit Visayas, NDRRMC reported only 138 dead

As of posting time, bodies are still being retrieved from the rubble left by the typhoon. Retrieval teams recently retrieved cadavers near coastal areas in Tacloban City.

At least 2,145,359 families or 9,996,065 people were affected in 10,716 villages in 44 provinces. Of these, 85,562 families or 398,377 people are staying in 1,526 evacuation centers.

Damage was estimated at P12,238,957,467.92, including P1,791,321,615 in infrastructure and P10,447,635,852.92 in agriculture.

The NDRRMC said Yolanda destroyed 323,454 houses and damaged 324,706 others.

Power outages are still being experienced in areas of Southern Luzon, Bicol, and Visayas. At least 566 transmission towers and poles were leaning or toppled.

Despite this, residents have started rebuilding their homes and opening stores. Some of the goods, however, were sold double the normal price.
 
NDRRMC has organized “Task Force Normalization” to help businesses in Yolanda-affected areas start operating again.
 
The Department of Social Welfare and Development, meanwhile, set up a hotline where typhoon victims can send messages to ask for relief goods.

Yolanda tore through Visayas and parts of Southern Luzon on Nov. 8, leaving a swath of destruction in its wake.

From Sunday to Tuesday, President Benigno Aquino visited several Yolanda-affected areas in Eastern Visayas to check on rehabilitation work there.

He returned to Manila Tuesday afternoon. — Amita Legaspi/LBG/KG, GMA News
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