Philippine:missing in deadly floods to more than 2,000

Water, toilets, and other facilities are all urgently needed to head offpotential epidemics, said AngelaTravis, a local spokeswoman for the UN Children's Fund.
"The water situation is still difficult and we are worried about whatthis means for their health," Travis told AFP, adding damaged tap watersystems meant fire trucks had to deliver to the camps.
Nearly half a million people require immediate assistance, United Nationsagencies estimate, including nearly 50,000 at evacuation centers and thosereduced to living with relatives and on the streets.
Snejal Soneji, country director for the non-government aid organizationOxfam, said it would put up latrines on top of about 200 portable toilets that UNICEF is scheduled to deliver on Sunday.

"They're resorting to unhygienic practices like not washing hands,which could lead to outbreaks of diseases," Soneji told AFP.
The United Nations,which launched a $28.6 million aid appeal on Thursday, likened the force of thedisaster to that of a tsunami.
A UN High Commissioner for Refugees chartered plane is to fly into Manila onFriday to deliver the first batch of 42 tonnes of emergency shelters, blankets,and kitchen implements intended for the flood areas.
As weary survivors of a disaster that swept away coastal shantytownsprepared for a bleak Christmas, authorities said there were now 1,079 peoplemissing after the weekend's deluge, up from 51.
The confirmed death toll meanwhile rose to 1,080 from 1,010.
More than half of those killed were from the major port cities of Cagayan de Oro andIligan on the large southern island of Mindanao.
The big jump in the missing came as rural families reported large numbers ofrelatives who had gone to work in the two cities and remained unaccounted for,civil defense official Ana Caneda said.
"There are whole families who have gone missing or who died. No oneinquired about them before," she told AFP, adding that often there was noone left to report their disappearance to the authorities.
As well, she said survivorswho were recovering from shock or injuries have also only just realized thatthey have missing family members.
However, civil defense Chief Benito Ramos told AFP that the list was"just an estimate" and that no one could say for sure how many peoplehad really been lost.
Authorities have warned that many of the dead may never be found after beingswept into the sea as tropical storm Washi brought heavy rains, flash floodsand overflowing rivers -- striking as slum-dwellers slept.
Among the missing is rickshaw driver Gilbert Olano, whose grainy photographs werebeing posted across Cagayan de Oro by his wife Arlene Olano, 41, after floodwaters devastatedtheir neighborhood.
They bore details his name, age and a telephone number for people to callwith any information on his whereabouts.
"How can we celebrate Christmas without my husband?" themother-of-three told AFP two days before the mainly Roman Catholic nation'smost festive holiday.
The family, among the many poor migrants who have colonized low-lying areasover the past decade, saw their house in the Tibasak shantytown swallowed upand taken away by the rising river before dawn Saturday.
When their two teenage daughters returned after the waters ebbed, all theysaw was a vast field of mud.
"I don't ever want to go back there. I hope the government will makegood on its promise to relocate us," said Olano, who said the family hadto line up for food rations after being left with nothing but the clothes theywere wearing.
"Sometimes it takes an hour. Sometimes we run out of food because themenfolk jump the queue. What can I do? I am just a woman."
National police Chief Nicanor Bartolome said armed officers were guardingthe slums-turned-ghost towns as the government builds replacement shelters onhigher ground.
"We really need to prevent people going back because these areas aretoo dangerous for them," Bartolome told reporters.
However Ramos said this would be for the longer term as no relocation siteswere ready as yet.