INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines – Death toll from Supertyphoon Yolanda (international name Haiyan) rose to 60 on Thursday, bringing the number of fatalities to 5,560.
Local chief executives and health officers of the typhoon-stricken areas have to certify the deaths before these are added to the official count of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.
In Tacloban City, one of the hard-hit areas, Senior Superintendent Pablito Cordeta of Task Force Cadaver said they recovered 34 bodies on Wednesday. Since November 15, they have retrieved 2,038 bodies in the city.
In the immediate aftermath of the typhoon, a regional police officer in Eastern Visayas estimated 10,000 deaths from Yolanda in Leyte province alone.
On Thursday, NDRRMC Executive Director del Rosario said it was “not possible” that the deaths could reach 10,000.
“I don’t think so. I think that it’s not possible. If it would double they should have retrieved a lot of bodies. But it increased by 60 and that was quite for a number of days. That means there are only a few bodies left,” he told reporters.
The NDRRMC official count also said that 1,757 remained missing.
Injured persons were at 26,136.
Over a million houses were damaged, and increased to 1,173,413.
Damage to property and agriculture remained at P24 billion.
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