PORTO ALEGRE (AP) – The mayor of a major city in southern Brazil has pleaded with residents to comply with his water rationing decree, given that some four-fifths of the population is without running water, a week after major flooding that has left at least 90 people dead and more than 130 others missing.
Efforts were continuing to rescue people stranded by the floods in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul, as more rains were forecast for the region into next week.
The capital, Porto Alegre, has been virtually cut off, with the airport and bus station closed and main roads blocked because of the floodwaters.
The floods in Brazil are among extreme weather events being seen around the world.
Yoga teacher Maria Vitória Jorge’s apartment building in downtown Porto Alegre is flooded, so she’s leaving it behind, having withdrawn about BRL8,000 (USD1,600) from her savings to rent an apartment for herself and her parents elsewhere in the state.
“I can’t shower at home, wash the dishes or even have drinkable water,” the 35-year-old Jorge said in her car as she prepared to travel. She had just a gallon of water for the 200-kilometre drive to the city of Torres, so far unaffected by the floods.
Five of the Porto Alegre’s six water treatment facilities aren’t working, and Porto Alegre Mayor Sebastião Melo on Monday decreed that water be used exclusively for “essential consumption”.
“We are living an unprecedented natural disaster and everyone needs to help,” Melo told journalists. “I am getting water trucks to football fields and people will have to go there to get their water in bottles. I cannot get them to go home.”
The most urgent need is drinking water, but food and personal hygiene products are also in short supply. Other Brazilian states are mobilising trucks with donations bound for Rio Grande do Sul.
There were long lines and empty shelves at supermarkets in Porto Alegre on Tuesday. Some people have tried to buy bottled water since the weekend, and when they could find it, their purchases were limited to two five-litre bottles.
Public health experts say there is also growing risk of disease as much of the region remains submerged, warning that cases of dengue fever and leptospirosis, a bacterial disease, in particular could rise sharply within days.
Adriano Hueck on Tuesday was attempting to retrieve medicine stocked at a friend’s warehouse, which is partially flooded.
“If we can save some of it, there’s still a chance it can be useful in hospitals,” said 53-year-old Hueck, who then pointed towards another part of the city. “My house is somewhere there. You can’t even see its roof now.”
