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Quake toll revised down as life slowly returns to normal AFP, June 5, 2006 Indonesian authorities have revised down the death toll from the Java earthquake to nearly 5,800, as survivors began to put their shattered lives back on track. The United Nations said distribution of food, medicines and water had greatly improved in devastated areas of central Java island, but emphasized the urgent need to provide shelter to some 340,000 left homeless by the temblor. In the disaster area, life slowly returned to normal, with morning markets bustling and primary school students sitting for end-of-year exams despite the fact that hundreds of schools were flattened in the May 27 quake. After sending assessment teams to Central Java and Yogyakarta provinces, the social affairs ministry revised down the quake death toll by some 450 people, from 6,234 to 5,782. The number of injured also went down to some 33,000. But the ministry dramatically raised the number of people displaced in the crisis, saying more than 343,000 had spent a ninth night in the open, many of them under rudimentary tents made of plastic sheeting and bamboo poles. "Emergency shelter remains one of our priorities," Puji Pujiono, the deputy area humanitarian coordinator for the United Nations, told AFP. On Sunday, the UN said there was a desperate need for building materials, as the Indonesian government said it would provide more than 160 million dollars to rebuild more than 200,000 homes destroyed or badly damaged in the zone. The United Nations has said 100 million dollars is needed over the next six months to cope with the disaster. "The food is in good shape, with inputs from the central government today. We are in a much better position compared to last week," Pujiono said. Indonesian Vice President Yusuf Kalla was due in Yogyakarta, the main city in the quake zone, later Monday to oversee ongoing relief efforts, his office said. The UN official said more clean water was being trucked into the region in a bid to avert widespread sanitation problems, cited by several UN agencies as a major short-term concern. "Sanitation is the highest priority because so many houses have been destroyed and most of the toilets have gone as well," said Astrid van Agthoven, water and sanitation project officer for the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF). "There is definitely a risk of water-borne and sanitation-related diseases, especially in densely populated areas," she added. Pujiono said the health care situation in the zone was "under control", with the tens of thousands of injured receiving appropriate medical attention, but warned of isolated shortfalls in supplies. In hard-hit Bantul district, life seemed to be returning to normal, with morning markets filled with fresh produce and sellers hawking their wares. Primary school students sat under tents or outside their damaged classrooms to take their end-of-year exams, with sixth-grade girls in the village of Serut clad in red and white uniforms clutching their papers in their laps. "All my friends are here. I feel happy to be here," said nine-year-old Adip, who played games with other children under a big blue tarpaulin suspended by bamboo poles. Teachers dispensed with regular lessons for the youngest students in an effort to get them used to the idea of returning to class after the quake trauma. To the north of the quake zone, the Mount Merapi volcano continued to belch heat clouds and send trails of lava down its slopes, heightening fears of an eruption. Indonesia maintained a red alert at the peak. Pujiono said local officials had evacuated several hundred villagers -- the elderly, women and children -- from areas nearest the lava flows, but stressed the rumbling volcano did not pose a "grave concern" to authorities.
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