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S.East Asian flood toll, damage rise after typhoon
04 Oct 2006 03:48:56 GMT
Source: Reuters

HANOI, Oct 4 (Reuters) - Floods and landslides triggered by Typhoon Xangsane have killed more than 150 people in Vietnam and the Philippines in the past week, officials said on Wednesday.

The typhoon's fierce winds and rain destroyed or damaged hundreds of thousands of homes when it slammed Vietnam's central coast on Sunday after bringing parts of the Philippines, including the capital Manila, to a standstill last week.

Vietnam's resort city of Danang, the country's fourth largest with 1 million people, was hardest-hit by the typhoon, both in terms of casualties and damage to homes, power supply and its seafood industry.

The National Flood and Storm Control Committee said at least 42 people were killed in Vietnam by the storm or swept away by floods in its aftermath. Seven were missing and 502 injured.

Initial estimates of damage were around 9.98 trillion dong ($623 million), the government said.

The committee warned residents along a 1,000 km (600-mile) area from Thanh Hoa province in the north to Daklak province in the Central Highlands to "be prepared for flash floods, landslides and flooding in the low-lying areas".

Heavy rains since Sunday have raised rivers to dangerous levels.

Officials in the Philippines said on Wednesday that the death toll had risen to 110 from 78 on Monday.

At least 88 people were injured and a further 79 were still missing. Around 2.9 billion pesos ($58 million) worth of properties were damaged by Xangsane, which means "elephant" in the Lao language.

The storm weakened after crossing into Vietnam and moved west across Laos and into Thailand.

Hundreds, if not thousands, of people are killed and property and crops damaged each year by tropical storms in the two countries, which are separated by the South China Sea. (Reporting by Nguyen Nhat Lam in Hanoi and Carmel Crimmins in Manila)
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A nurse lifts Natonon (R) past his older twin brother Natawut at the Phayathai orphanage in Bangkok November 29, 2006. The twins, born on November 10 to an HIV-positive mother in jail, are suspected of carrying the virus. Each day, 1800 children worldwide become infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, the vast majority of them newborn babies, according to the United Nations. Thailand is one of the few Asian countries that provides drugs to prevent mother-to-child transmission as part of the country's anti-AIDS program. However, health experts say there are gaps in coverage for marginal groups such as drug users and migrant workers.