International aid teams have landed in Asia's tsunami-devastated villages in a desperate race to prevent the spread of diseases in one of the biggest catastrophe relief operations in history.
As survivors buried their dead in mass graves, with the death toll from Sunday's tsunami now more than 68,000, aid teams from Japan, India, Israel, Russia, France, Germany and Taiwan worked today to restore drinking water and sanitation.
IFRC secretary general Mr Markku Niskala
Many coastal villages and resorts, now nothing more than mud-covered rubble blanketed with the stench of rotting corpses, remained inaccessible to heavy earth moving equipment needed to clear debris and dispose of bodies.
"We are especially concerned about people in remote coastal areas, which are difficult to reach because many roads and bridges have been destroyed," said Mr Jeff Dick, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) director in Sri Lanka. "Communication lines remain extremely problematic, and many key logistic routes needed to transport food have been blocked."
Areas effectively cut off included eastern Sri Lanka, India's remote Andaman and Nicobar islands and Indonesia's northern Aceh province, near the epicentre of the 9.0 magnitude earthquake that set off the tsunami.
Sri Lanka is the hardest hit country, with a death toll of nearly 22,000, and some 1.5 million homeless and the toll is bound to rise.
The World Bank estimates that some 500 miles of railway, one of the main transport lifelines in Sri Lanka, has been destroyed by the tsunami.
The WFP, the world's largest humanitarian agency, was trucking food supplies to 12 districts in Sri Lanka and sending emergency teams to Sri Lanka's cut-off coasts.
"As search and rescue operations continue and medical assistance to the victims is provided, food aid for those who have lost their homes and belongings in the destruction - together with health, shelter and sanitation concerns - will become more acute," Mr Dick said.
The United Nations said it was preparing to issue what could be its largest appeal for donations in its history to cope with its biggest and costliest relief effort.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) is seeking to raise over €30 million. "This is the largest catastrophe we have seen in decades. We haven't even seen the tip of the iceberg yet," said IFRC secretary general Mr Markku Niskala. "We face a huge challenge due to the vast area affected."
More than 40,000 people were being temporarily housed in 66 Red Cross camps and shelters in Sri Lanka, with thousands more seeking shelter in temples, praying another tsunami won't hit.
Disease could kill as many people as those killed by the wall of water, a top World Health Organisation (WHO) official said.
Red Cross teams specialising in water and sanitation were landing in Sri Lanka and Indonesia to ensure access to potable water to prevent diseases, particularly malaria.
The Red Cross said it expected demand for aid would rise once remote areas were reached, particularly the Andaman and Nicobar islands and Aceh.
"We fear the death toll and the numbers of homeless and injured will significantly rise in Indonesia as information comes in from outlying regions," it said in a statement.
In Khao Lak on Thailand's southern coast, Taiwanese and German relief teams worked alongside local volunteers, forced to retrieve hundreds of bodies by hand for fear that damaged resort buildings may collapse.
An international fleet of naval ships and military and chartered aircraft were headed today for tsunami hit countries, delivering hundreds of tonnes of plastic sheeting for body disposal, tents, sanitation kits and food.