Indonesia: obvious lack of food and medical care

Photo: Indonesia: obvious lack of food and medical care

Though international relief workers have poured into the quake area, many villagers complained they were not getting the help they needed. Some searched for scraps of tin and other materials to rebuild crumbled homes, while others blocked traffic to beg for money.

Others placed flower pots and trash cans on nearby roads to slow traffic and beg for donations, the AP reports.

The death toll from Saturday's 6.3-magnitude quake on Java island rose to 6,234 after officials reported 388 more bodies in remote corners of Bantul, said Andi Hanindito, an official at the Social Affairs Ministry, the AP reports.

The temblor that struck soon after dawn Saturday reduced more than 135,000 houses into piles of bricks, tiles and wood in less than a minute, displacing some 647,000 people, said Bambang Priyohadi, a provincial official.

Nearly a third of them now live under plastic sheets close to their former homes, in rice fields or on roadsides, while the rest are staying with relatives, he said. Their misery has been compounded by days of intermittent rain and blazing sun.

The United Nations said the crisis appeared to be easing with the arrival of aid workers and assistance from more than 20 countries, even as hospitals continued to struggle to find beds for the tens of thousands of injured.

The U.N. World Food Program said US$5 million (Ђ3.8 million) was needed over the next few months to pay for emergency rations of enriched noodles and high energy biscuits.

The main hospital in Bantul remained overwhelmed, with patients cramming corridors or sleeping on pieces of cardboard in the parking lot, and doctors complained of a lack of supplies.