Tacloban, Philippines (CNN) -- The cries of the suffering carried through a small, cramped one-story clinic in typhoon-ravaged Tacloban where the medicine was all but gone Thursday, but the number of wounded in the hard-hit Philippine city continued to grow.

The clinic at the airport in the decimated capital city of Leyte province is one of the few places where those injured in Super Typhoon Haiyan and its aftermath can turn for help, what little help there is six days after the storm.

"We don't have any medicines. We don't have any supplies. We have IVs, but it's running out," Dr. Katrina Catabay told CNN.

"Most of the people don't have water and food. That's why they come here. Most of the kids are dehydrated. They are suffering from diarrhea and vomit-ing."

Help is coming, on military and civilian transports, by air and by sea. But much of it has been piling up at airports.

While relief organizations say they have been able to deliver limited aid to some victims, many CNN crews reported seeing little sign of any large-scale organized re-lief effort in the hardest-hit areas.

Blame Haiyan and its unprecedented strength and scope, said UNICEF spokesman Christopher De Bono.

"I don't think that's anyone's fault. I think it's the geography and the devastation," he said.

Still, the desperation is increasing, and becoming more serious.

"We mostly need food and water, that's the most important," Catabay said. "We need supplies."

At the clinic, a Philippine military officer called names off a clipboard, the names of those who will be airlifted out of the city.

"The elderly, the children that are sick" are the priority, the officer said.

For at least one man, the evacuation came too late.

The man died at the clinic. His body was put on a gurney and pushed to the end of a hallway because there is nowhere to put him, the clinic staff said.

Death toll climbs

Throughout the devastation, bodies of victims lie buried in the debris or out in the open.

The government hasn't counted them all yet, but initial fears that 10,000 may have died have subsided.

By Thursday morning, the official death toll had climbed to 2,357, disaster officials said. The typhoon left 3,853 people injured and 77 people missing, according to the Philippines' National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.

Mayor of Tacloban's story of survival Storm survivors desperate for aid Survivors tell stories of terrible loss

The toll is "going to be horrific," Philippine Interior Minister Mar Roxas said.

"There are still many towns that have not sent in complete reports and out of the 40 towns of Leyte, for example, only 20 have been contacted. So there's another 20 towns with no communication," he said.

"It's going to be a high death toll. I don't want to go into just throwing out numbers."

Philippine President Benigno Aquino III told CNN's Christiane Amanpour on Tuesday that he expected the final number would likely be around 2,000 to 2,500.

When it struck Friday, Haiyan, known in the Philippines as Yolanda, flattened entire towns.

The storm destroyed at least 80,000 homes, according to the latest Philippine government accounting. Although estimates of the number left homeless vary, the Philippine government puts it at more than 582,000.

Expecting to die

The storm also shattered families. Mayple Nunal and her husband, Ignacio, lost their two daughters, Gnacy Pearl and Gnacy May -- washed away when the storm's ferocious storm surge ripped through Tacloban.

"The big waves, we were like inside the washing machine," Mayple Nunal said. "And we were expecting that we would die."

While Nunal and her husband are safe, receiving treatment in Cebu, United Nations officials have warned of increasing desperation and lawlessness among those left homeless.

Eight people died when a wall collapsed Tuesday during a stampede at a government warehouse in Leyte province, Philippine National Food Authority administrator Orlan Calayag said Wednesday. Police and security stood by as people stormed the building and took some 100,000 sacks of rice, he said.

The United Nations said the situation is especially dangerous for women and children. Some areas haven't been reached yet, according to Valerie Amos, the U.N. under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief.

Police warned a CNN crew to turn back Wednesday on the road south of Tacloban, saying rebels had been shooting at civilians.

"Maybe they are looking for food," a police commander told CNN.

"Pushing aid" to Tacloban

U.S. Marines arrived Wednesday in Cebu, transforming the sleepy airbase there into a buzzing center of activity as cargo aircraft, tilt-rotor Ospreys and camouflaged Marines got to work preparing for the enormous job of receiving, sorting and delivering aid to millions in need.

Two 747 airplanes loaded with humanitarian aid from the United States have arrived, and Marines are "pushing aid" from Cebu to Tacloban, Brig. Gen. Paul Kennedy said on CNN's "Situation Room"

"It's a serious situation down here," Kennedy said. "...Some of those neighborhoods are inundated with

water, and some of it's inaccessible" because of the de-bris.

One of the big problems is figuring out how to get needed supplies, including heavy machinery, to these areas.

"It's a matter of capacity at this point. This just doesn't come out of a box. It has to be moved down here. It's a remote location," he said.

The Royal Australian Air Force also landed at Cebu, delivering a portable field hospital that was soon sent on its way to Tacloban. Taiwanese troops also arrived with medical aid, and Doctors Without Borders said three of nine cargo shipments it has planned also arrived in Cebu on Wednesday.

The planes carried medical supplies, shelter materials, hygiene kits and other gear, the agency said.

U.N.: Pace of relief lacking

Teams from Doctors Without Borders also have reached remote Guiuan, a village of about 45,000 that was among the first areas hit by the full force of the storm, the agency said.

"The situation here is bleak," said Alexis Moens, the aid group's assessment team leader. "The village has been flattened -- houses, medical facilities, rice fields, fishing boats all destroyed. People are living out in the open; there are no roofs left standing in the whole of Guiuan. The needs are immense and there are a lot of surrounding villages that are not yet covered by any aid organizations."

Meanwhile, the U.N. World Food Programme began

distributing food in Tacloban, handing out rice to 3,000 people on Wednesday, the agency said, and the U.S. Agency for International Development also said it expected to deliver its first shipment of relief supplies to victims on Wednesday.

The uptick in aid deliveries comes a day after the road between the capital, Manila, and hard-hit Tacloban opened, holding out the promise that aid will begin to flow more quickly.

But six days after the storm struck -- with more than 2 million people in need of food, according to the Philippine government -- even the U.N.'s Amos acknowledged the pace of relief is still lacking.

"This is a major operation that we have to mount," she said Wednesday. "We're getting there. But in my view it's far too slow."

Philippine President Aquino has defended relief efforts, saying that in addition to all the challenges of blocked roads and downed power and communication lines, local governments were overwhelmed, forcing the federal government to step in and perform both its own role and those of local officials.

Most of all, he told CNN on Tuesday, "nobody I magined the magnitude that this super typhoon brought on us."

Source: C. Carter, A. Cooper, A. Corren (2013, November 14) http://edition.cnn.com/2013/11/13/world/asia/typhoon-haiyan/index.html?c=world

The United Nations said relief efforts in the

Philippines have improved a week after Typhoon Yolanda hit

the country. But the organization also said there is still

much to be done.

John Ging, director of operations of the UN Office

for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said Philippine

authorities have been able to mobilize relief despite

problems with infrastructure, logistics and personnel

shortage.

But he said efforts could not come fast enough.

"We have to keep on the accelerator because too

many people have not received assistance. But they should

know that the assistance is on the way and that is

evidenced by every day significantly more people receiving

the support that they so desperately and urgently need,"

Ging said.

Meanwhile, local officials are trying to speed up relief

efforts in the Visayas.

Department of Interior and Local Government

(DILG) Sec. Mar Roxas said 38 out of the 40 towns in Leyte

have already received aid coming from hubs in Tacloban and

Ormoc.

Roxas also said helicopters have been tapped to bring

relief to hard-hit areas in Eastern Samar, particularly the

towns of Hernani, Salcedo, Guiuan and Balangiga.

They are working non-stop to speed up delivery of

aid as more trucks arrive to bring goods.

"Nagtatrabaho kami all night para yung karga sa gabi

ginagawa, hindi tulad nung Thursday na alas-6 ginagawa yung

karga…kahapon yung mga truck naka-tatlong round trip

versus nung Thursday isa't kalahating round trip lang,"

Roxas said.

Finance Sec. Cesar Purisima said the government is

expanding its food repacking capacity and will attempt to

bring its distribution hub closer to disaster sites after

drawing flak for its slow relief effort.

Purisima said the distribution hub in Manila has been

producing 150,000 relief packs per day, the minimum set by

President Aquino.

The Cebu relief center is also producing 30,000 packs

per hour.

A government relief pack contains 6 kilos of rice, 8

canned goods, 8 packs of noodles, and 8 coffee sachets.

These packs are good for 2 days for a family.

Purisima said about 200,000 relief packs have been

UN: Many haven't gotten relief goods

sent through RO-RO (roll on, roll off) ferries that should

reach typhoon-hit areas by Sunday.

"This is a massive logistical exercise," Purisima said.

He also said the government has asked manufacturers

to increase production.

Also, government has launched a P50 million

emergency jobs program that will hire survivors of Typhoon

Yolanda to rebuild ravaged cities.

The Department of Labor said at least 12,600 people

in Leyte, Eastern Samar and Western Samar will be paid

P260 per day to do reconstruction work for 15 days.

Labor Sec. Rosalinda Baldoz said they are doubling

the budget for this project to P100 million to cover

another tranche in January.

Economists have said that rehabilitation and

emergency jobs will temper the impact of the disaster on

the economy, which economic managers said could take a

modest hit.

In Northern Cebu. Cebu Gov. Hilario Davide III said

they counted 65 fatalities and 200 injured.

Davide said relief efforts will be focused on far-flung

towns that have yet to receive aid.

He said among the most hit is Daanbantayan where

Yolanda made one of 6 landfalls in the Visayas, the island

towns of Santa Fe and Bantayan and the towns of Bogo and

Borbon, all at the northern tip of Cebu.

Davide said foreign medical teams are on the ground

treating the injured. But they also need food, water and

shelter. He said it may take 3 months for power to be

restored in the island towns, although the mainland could

be back online in a month's time. Cebu's local government

is also preparing make-shift homes for the displaced.

The Bureau of Customs (BOC) also said it is

donating some P5.5 million of seized goods from China to

the Department of Social Welfare and Development

(DSWD).

The seized goods are composed of smuggled

vegetables which was stopped at the Mindanao Container

Terminal in Misamis Oriental and was misdeclared as apples

and 10 container vans of rice earlier forfeited by the BOC.

The DSWD will be converting the seized goods into

relief items.

Source:

ANC (2013, November 16)

http://anc.yahoo.com/news/un--many-haven-t-gotten-relief-

goods-094727498.html

Long-term foreign investments in the country more than doubled in August as the Philippine economy shined as a bright spot amid dim conditions in both advanced and emerging markets. Documents from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) showed that foreign direct investments (FDI), which are more tangible investments that are more likely to create new jobs, increased 123 percent year-on-year to $143 million in August. “The significant rise in investments into the country reflects the positive outlook of investors on the Philippines’ economic prospects in spite of challenging global economic conditions,” the BSP said in a statement. “Domestic economic prospects have been supported by sound macroeconomic fundamentals and a smoothly functioning financial system,” it added. The Philippines had Southeast Asia’s fastest-growing economy in the first half of the year. Supported by robust consumer demand and higher government spending, gross domestic product (GDP) increased by 7.5 percent in the first semester, matching the performance of China, Asia’s largest market.

In its report, the BSP said inflows were observed in all three components that make up the final FDI figure. Foreign placements in debt instruments, which refer to

advances made by multinationals to their local subsidiaries, reversed to a net inflow of $47 million from an outflow of $44 million the month before, the BSP said. “Parent companies abroad continued to lend to their local subsidiaries and affiliates to fund existing operations and expand their businesses in the country,” the BSP reported. Instead of taking their profits back to their main offices, more multinationals also chose to reinvest the earnings of their Philippine subsidiaries for the expansion of their local operations. A net inflow of $54 million in reinvested earnings was booked during the eight-month period. Net inflows of $42 million were also reported in the equity capital component, which are large acquisitions by foreign compa-nies of shares in local firms. These equity capital placements mostly came from the United States, Singapore, United Kingdom, Japan and Germany. These funds went mainly to companies in the financial and insurance, real estate, manufacturing, and information and communications technology sectors.

Source: P. Montecillo (2013, November 11) Philippine Daily Inquirer http://business.inquirer.net/151877/foreign-investments-surged-123-in-august

Foreign investments surged 123% in August