“I will never be able to forget what happened – I can still feel the earth shaking,” says Rana Bitar, her voice catching in her throat.
The charity boss says she misplaced 72 members of her prolonged household within the devastating earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria final 12 months.
“I felt terror, fear and worry,” she tells Sky News, showing near tears as she remembers the second the 7.8-magnitude quake hit the area, killing tens of hundreds of individuals.
“At first, I did not know what was happening. I thought it was a war, that we were being bombed. I heard the sounds of explosions.”
At the time, Ms Bitar was alone at house together with her two-and-a-half-year-old son in Gaziantep in Turkey, near the epicentre.
As her flat shook, she picked up the toddler and rushed down seven flights of stairs and out into the “extremely cold weather” and snow. They had been wearing pyjamas and Ms Bitar was strolling barefoot.
“It was horrible,” she says. “I was only thinking about my child, my parents, my family members.
“I recalled my entire life. I known as my mom in Belgium and advised her: ‘If one thing occurs to me, I simply needed to say goodbye.'”
Ms Bitar, her husband and their son spent the next eight days living in their car and a nearby mosque.
At first, they did not know what had happened or how much death and destruction the earthquake had caused.
After learning the extent of the disaster on the news and discovering she had lost family, friends and colleagues, Ms Bitar says she had a nervous breakdown.
The 72 members of her extended family who died were related to her from her father’s side, she says. They had fled together from Latakia in Syria to Hatay in Turkey, which was the hardest-hit province.
Whole households had been worn out, together with Ms Bitar’s uncle and aunt and their kids and grandchildren, she says. The youngest relative to die was 5, whereas the oldest was 79.
“Losing so many loved ones and relatives was very sad and painful. I cried a lot,” she says. “I cannot explain the fear I have felt since the day of the earthquake.
“A number of days in the past I used to be having lunch with my husband and he began shaking his leg – I used to be terrified and requested him whether or not one other earthquake was occurring.”
Hidden health problems
More than a year since the earthquake struck on 6 February 2023, many survivors are struggling with the trauma of losing loved ones and suffering from hidden health problems.
The earthquake killed more than 50,000 people in Turkey and some 5,900 people in Syria, while leaving millions homeless.
As effectively as bodily accidents sustained within the catastrophe, survivors have suffered psychological issues, together with insomnia and consuming issues, in response to Madara Hettiarachchi, director of programmes on the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC).
She says there was a noticeable improve in psychological points because the anniversary approached, telling Sky News: “The aftershocks don’t help and being cloistered in container camps is a double whammy.”
Many survivors discovered themselves breaking down into tears, Ms Hettiarachchi says, including: “There was a lot of crying, a lot of feeling fragile.
“Some individuals thought that they had moved on. One lady stated, ‘I assumed I used to be robust, I assumed I used to be coping okay, however I really feel actually emotional and prefer it’s going backwards’.”
‘Easy for diseases to spread’
More than three million people were displaced by the earthquake, which flattened towns and caused widespread destruction in cities, leaving many who lost their homes living in temporary accommodation while struggling to find new places to live.
The DEC says some 787,000 people are still living in shelters, flimsy tents and so-called container cities in Turkey, as of December last year, where they are at greater risk of respiratory illnesses and seasonal flu, as well as scabies, lice and cholera.
“They’re small crowded spaces with very limited water and sanitation, so it’s easy for diseases to spread,” warns Ms Hettiarachchi. She says support companies have been centered on selling hygiene and providing catastrophe aid akin to hygiene kits, which embody bathing cleaning soap, laundry cleaning soap, toothbrushes and sanitary pads.
Some 15 million individuals in Syria had been already in want of humanitarian help earlier than the catastrophe struck, with injury to pipes and water tanks growing the chance of waterborne illnesses akin to cholera and dysentery.
Several aid employees say there was a rise in miscarriages and early births after the earthquake, whereas some moms had hassle breastfeeding.
“Earthquakes and other disasters have a profound impact on the stress levels not only within communities but particularly among pregnant women,” Ozlem Kudret Cokmez, a sexual and reproductive well being counsellor at Doctors Of The World Turkey, tells Sky News.
“Pregnancy and childbirth, already stress-inducing on their own, become even more challenging when coupled with factors like the degree of exposure to earthquakes, the loss of relatives, family breakdown, or relocation to new environments.”
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Rise in gender-based violence
Ms Cokmez says there have been will increase in gender-based violence, together with home abuse and sexual assault, in addition to early marriages and youngster labour, amid unemployment, restricted entry to fundamental wants, psychological well being points and trauma.
In response to such dangers, charities like Space Of Peace – the organisation led by Ms Bitar – have been providing secure areas and psychological and social help to girls, in addition to providing workshops for them to study English and different expertise to assist them discover jobs amid the worsening financial scenario.
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Syrian refugees – having fled almost 13 years of civil battle to Turkey – noticed the earthquake heap additional distress upon their plight. “These people lost their homes many times,” Ms Bitar says. “First when they went from Syria to Turkey, then again after the earthquake. They are struggling on so many levels.”
As effectively because the psychological injury of the catastrophe, round 70% of the 118,000 individuals injured within the earthquake have long-term rehabilitation points, in response to the World Health Organisation. In response, charities have been offering bodily remedy, wheelchairs and crutches.
Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has pledged to supply 200,000 houses throughout the realm affected by the earthquake by the tip of the 12 months.
Ms Hettiarachchi believes there’s some trigger for optimism, saying: “Hearing stories both from aid workers as well as people who have benefited from humanitarian assistance, there is some sort of relief, there is progress.”
But she provides: “It’s worth remembering the scale of it. Any response, either by the government or by humanitarian agencies, pales by comparison. It just feels like we’re scratching the surface.”
Source: information.sky.com”