World Ignored Worst Latin Disaster, Expert Says : Chile Quake Left 984,000 Homeless but Nations With More Dead Got More Aid

Latin America’s worst natural disaster of the century hit Chile last year and the world scarcely noticed it, according to an American disaster relief expert.

In 1985, a volcanic mud slide buried 23,000 people in the Colombian town of Armero and earthquakes flattened parts of Mexico City, killing more than 7,000 people. International aid poured in after both disasters.

But for Paul Bell, the U.S. government’s top disaster relief expert for the region, “the March 3 earthquake in Chile was the worst natural catastrophe in Latin America this century.”

Far More Homeless

“There were only 180 dead, it’s true, but we estimate that 984,000 were made homeless. Compare that to 100,000 in Mexico and only 8,000 in Colombia,” Bell said in an interview.

“Almost any way you look at it, other than in family bereavement, Chile’s was the worst. . . . It has to be top of the misery index.”

This does not mean that a million Chileans--a 12th of the country’s population--are still sleeping in the streets.

The victims have largely sunk into the country’s underworld of poverty while the damage seems only to have accelerated a process of urban decay that was already far advanced.

Crumbling, empty buildings, some with masonry poised to fall, abound in downtown Santiago. In the residential districts of single-story adobe houses, cracks have been plastered over and facades repainted.

Stoicism Hides Suffering

“You’re going to find many, many families living in very dangerous buildings because they have nowhere else to go,” Bell said. “We found family after family living in rubble with a piece of plastic over the top. There’s so much invisible poverty behind the facades, but the stoicism of the poor hides a lot of the suffering too.”

Bell, 57, was in Santiago for a two-week workshop on disaster relief organized by the U.S. Office for Foreign Disaster Assistance, for which he is regional adviser, and the Pan-American Health Organization.

Government officials from eight countries will work on relief plans and techniques together with Chile’s National Emergency Office, which Bell says is the best of its kind in Latin America.

“From a professional point of view, working with (the Chilean agency) was an unusual experience . . . a vast difference from the confusion of Mexico City or the lack of coordination in Colombia,” he said.

Recurring Problems

In 12 years as a Baptist missionary, a spell with the Peace Corps and the experience of coordinating U.S. relief efforts for earthquakes in Peru, Nicaragua and Guatemala, Bell has seen certain problems recur.

“We’re trying to impress upon people that it’s their responsibility only to request what is identified as a genuine need,” he said. “We have to go beyond the drama and tears.”

Haunting pictures of the dramas in Mexico and Colombia--opera star Placido Domingo searching the rubble of Mexico City for his relatives and the slow, smiling death of 12-year-old Omayra Sanchez in the mud and water of Armero--brought a flood of donations from abroad which often bore no relation to needs.

Bell said 40 tons of medicine went unused in Mexico and four warehouses in Bogota were left full of clothes and other supplies, even after everyone who had a claim to be a disaster victim was invited to take as much as he or she could.

Local Supplies Available

“In Mexico City I saw so many cases of items being shipped in by the ton from Europe and the United States when what was needed was . . . available locally.

“Italy, for example, flew in metal water containers when we could have bought lighter, better, plastic ones for a dollar each locally and helped the Mexican economy,” he said.

“The worst experience I ever had was in Sri Lanka, when the U.S. flew in 50,000 blankets costing $5 each and I could have bought them for a third of the price in Madras, India, 100 miles away,” Bell said.

Another ever-present feature of natural disasters is what Bell calls the myth of impending epidemic.

“It’s almost never a danger,” he said. “In Armero, we could have used some deodorant but people don’t die from foul-smelling air.”

Do-Gooders in Way

But the biggest obstacles of all, Bell says, are amateur do-gooders. They were especially prominent in Mexico City, a short hop away from the United States.

“I call it the vulture syndrome,” he said. “They circle, waiting for a tragedy, but their egos don’t understand the real needs. . . . I spent so much time in Mexico City holding the hands of Americans and telling them where they could get a hamburger.”