WORLD NEWS

Typhoon Bopha hit the Philippines on 2 December 2012, affecting 6.2 million families - amongst them Analyn (34), her husband and their four children.
"Just after typhoon Bopha struck our village, my family immediately transferred to the elementary school where it was used as an evacuation center. We left our house because the water from the river flooded our house. We stayed there for at least a month. We had nowhere to go. We were happy to receive the shelter kits from Save. We installed the plastic sheets (trapal) replacing the roof ripped off by the typhoon. My husband tried to gather materials that can be salvaged and re-use to fix our house," says Analyn.
"My youngest daughter got sick: flu, fever, cough. My youngest child was crying all the time. My four-year-old child was scared. It was raining hard."
"I had a caesarean section when I had my last child. I gave birth just before the typhoon. I stayed with my mother after the operation."
"After the typhoon, I felt I was getting weak every day. I could not move that much. They said I had Kawasaki disease. I took some pain reliever for a week. I feel better now and I can manage normal household chores, but not the heavy ones like laundry. My family has helped to take care of my children as I could not do everything."
Many families have now returned to their original communities but are remain settled in make-shift shelters, living in the ruins of their homes combining it with emergency shelter materials provided to them. However, this situation still poses protection concerns because they lack safe communal areas, with limited water and electricity supply while living in the open areas.
Analyn's family have also returned home.
"I am not earning from anything at the moment. I depend on my parents and from food relief."
"We do not have land at all. We only depend on our earnings as labourers at the banana plantation. The banana plantation was badly damaged by the typhoon. My mother owns a hectare of land but she shares it with her maternal family."
Her husband works as a miner in the Agusan River, mining gold particles. His earnings are used to buy milk for the youngest child and food for the family. He had to switch professions after Typhoon Bopha destroyed the banana plantations he was working in.
"My husband went to Mati to work on small scale mining. He was invited to work there by our neighbour who had experience working there. He left me Php 100 before going to Mati to work."
He makes about 500 to 1,000 pesos per day from panning and does it at least four times a week. The community believes that the gold dust were drawn downwards due to the flooding from the mountains during the typhoon.
"We need rice for the family. My children need vitamins."
"As a mother I need things to be used in my household as cooking utensils, things to use in doing the laundry, clothes box. I need medicine whenever I feel ill. I need food. I need a decent shelter for my family, hopefully some galvanized iron (GI) sheets, or even it is made of wood."
Analyn hopes to send her children to school and provide for their other basic needs like nutritious food. However, she cannot afford nutritious food, medicine, clothes and education for them.
"I am still worried (after almost 3 months) because I don't know where to get support for the needs of my children, now that my husband has left to work at a small scale mining."
Save the Children has distributed household items, hygiene kits, fresh water, jerry cans, emergency shelter kits, newborn kits and back-to-school packages. Additionally, the children's aid agency has set up child-friendly spaces, temporary learning spaces and conducted cash-for-work programs for those who have lost their livelihoods in the typhoon.
Save the Children aims to provide assistance to 14,000 families including 42,000 children representing 25% of the seriously affected people in the areas worst hit by Bopha. To date, 125.59% of the target families, 95.93% of the target individuals and 91.87% of the target children have been reached.