Officials in New Orleans have prepared 25,000 body bags following last week's hurricane as concerns grow about the risks posed by toxic floodwaters.
Police rescue a resident of New Orleans yesterday
Asked if authorities expected that many bodies, a spokesman for the state Department of Health and Hospitals said: "We don't know what to expect."
Mayor C. Ray Nagin had earlier said New Orleans' death toll could reach 10,000. Already, a temporary warehouse morgue in rural St. Gabriel that had been prepared to take 1,000 bodies was being readied to handle 5,000.
The official death toll in Mississippi climbed to 201 yesterday, but more than 1,000 are feared dead there, too.
Across miles of ravaged neighbourhoods of clapboard houses, grand estates and housing projects, workers struggled to find corpses and convince the city's last stubborn residents to leave.
"Right now, human life is paramount so I'm concentrating all my power on getting out people who want to leave," New Orleans Police Chief Eddie Compass told NBC's Todayshow today.
The floodwaters are thick with sewage-related bacteria that are at least 10 times higher than acceptable safety limits. The waters contain E.coli, certain viruses and a type of cholera-like bacteria.
"If you haven't left the city yet, you must do so," said Dr Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CCD). She urged anyone coming into contact with the water to scrub with soap and water.
The bacteria is feared to have migrated to crowded shelters outside the state, where many evacuees are staying. Four deaths - one in Texas, three in Mississippi - have been attributed to wound infections, said a spokesman for the CDC.
In Mississippi, efforts to restore power to residents along the battered coast were moving along. Governor Haley Barbour said today that power would be restored by September 11th to all homes and businesses able to receive it.