Charity prioritises clean water for quake victims

Helping restore a clean water supply could be one of the "major issues" to deal with after an earthquake in Myanmar and Thailand, charity workers said.

A crew from Truro-based ShelterBox has arrived in Bangkok to offer aid to people who have been affected by a 7.7 magnitude earthquake which struck near Mandalay in Myanmar on Friday.

Myanmar's military chief said, as of Tuesday, 2,700 people had died in the quake with a further 4,521 injured in the country.

Martin Strutton, ShelterBox's senior emergency coordinator, said the team's focus would be on Myanmar but it would need to assess what help was needed before deciding the next steps.

Mr Strutton said getting information out of Myanmar, which is controlled by a military junta, had been difficult due to the war-torn country's rulers supplying limited data.

He added an appeal from the charity - which specialises in supporting people to rebuild their lives after disaster or conflict - had received a number of generous donations.

Along with providing household and sheltering items including tents and repair kits, Mr Strutton said there could be other big issues the charity would need to deal with.

"I think one of the key things here is we're seeing a problem with clean water supply, it's a major issue and there's a real risk of disease as a result of that," he said.

"We are looking to provide water purification systems in order to overcome that."

Mr Strutton said despite the limited information coming out of Myanmar, he could see there had been "very significant damage" caused by the quake.

He added: "There's something like 2m people live within 10-15km (6.2-9.3 miles) of the epicentre, so a lot of those people will be in significant trouble.

"Our job is to get across there as soon as we possibly can and find out what that really looks like and see if we can support it."

Follow BBC Cornwall on X, Facebook and Instagram. Send your story ideas to [email protected].