Image caption HMS Illustrious is being sent to the Philippines to help the aid effort 
 
 The aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious will be sent to help people affected by the typhoon in the Philippines, Prime Minister David Cameron has said. 
 
 Speaking on a visit to India, Mr Cameron also said the UK government had now given more than £20m in aid. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) said its UK appeal had raised £23m in its first 48 hours. 
 
 Typhoon Haiyan, which hit on Friday, killed at least 2,300 people and displaced more than half a million. 
 
 HMS Illustrious is currently in the Gulf and is expected to arrive in the Philippines on 24 November. 
 
 The carrier will relieve destroyer HMS Daring, which is already on its way to the country and should arrive on Friday. 
 
 'Absolute tragedy' 
 
 Mr Cameron said helicopters from HMS Illustrious would be used to take food and water to people stranded in remote parts of the Philippines, which is made up of more than 7,000 islands. 
 
 The carrier, which currently has 900 crew and seven helicopters, has equipment to provide water suitable for drinking, which Mr Cameron said was badly needed. 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption David Cameron said it was clear long term help was needed in the Philippines 
 
 "What happened in the Philippines is an absolute tragedy," he said. 
 
 "You can see the devastation, the suffering, and it's quite clear that we are going to need long-term help for those people." 
 
 The Royal Navy said almost all of its ships carried supplies and equipment for use in such emergencies and added its crews were trained for dealing with humanitarian disasters. 
 
 HMS Daring has more than 200 personnel on board including a doctor, a dentist, engineers and a chaplain. It is also carrying members of the Royal Marines band who, as a secondary role, are trained first aiders. 
 
 The ship holds 700 ration packs, can provide more than 20,000 litres of water, and has other equipment including generators and thermal-imaging cameras. 
 
 Image caption An international aid effort is under way to help people in the Philippines 
 
 Image caption Many people in storm-hit areas are desperate for food and water 
 
 Image caption HMS Daring is expected to arrive in the Philippines on Friday 
 
 The UK is also sending aid to the Philippines by air. The first flight arrived at 16:00 GMT on Tuesday. 
 
 A specialist cargo aircraft loaded with equipment to speed up the offloading of relief supplies at airfields and help with rubble clearance was also deployed. 
 
 A team of 12 medical experts from the UK, requested by the Philippines Department of Health, has also flown to the country. 
 
 Secretary of State for International Development, Justine Greening, said Britain was "helping thousands of people in desperate need". 
 
 Elsewhere, the Ministry of Defence said it would be deploying a Royal Air Force C-17 military transport aircraft in the early hours of Friday morning. 
 
 'Remarkable' support 
 
 A huge international aid effort is under way, but widespread infrastructure damage is hampering efforts to distribute it to some areas. 
 
 These are extraordinary figures, and this allows us to get aid right into the heart of this catastrophe Justin Forsyth, Save the Children 
 
 A US aircraft carrier and other US vessels have already arrived in the Philippines, where the UN estimates 11 million people have been affected by the typhoon. 
 
 The DEC, which brings together 14 major UK charities, launched its appeal on Monday and said the response from the public had been "remarkable". 
 
 DEC chief executive Saleh Saeed said: "This has already become one of our most generously-supported appeals but there is still a huge humanitarian need for help." 
 
 Paul Jenkins, of the British Red Cross, one of the DEC's members, said: "We are so amazed that the generosity of the British public - in very difficult times for everybody - is still there." 
 
 He said the priority was to get "goods and supplies" to those most in need as quickly as possible. 
 
 Planes carrying British Red Cross aid have started landing in the Philippines following early difficulties due to the damage done by the storm, Mr Jenkins added. 
 
 Image caption The British Red Cross is sending aid and equipment to the Philippines 
 
 Justin Forsyth, chief executive of Save the Children, said: "These are extraordinary figures, and this allows us to get aid right into the heart of this catastrophe. 
 
 "Aid is beginning to get through even in the worst affected areas. Save the Children has landed a plane today in Cebu and all the Disasters Emergency Committee agencies are there trying to do their best, but we need to get more aid in and very quickly." 
 
 British couple Andrea Agarwal and Trevor Holmes, who own a dive centre in the island of Malapascua, have been helping with the aid effort. 
 
 They were not on the island at the time the typhoon hit but said their bar and restaurant was destroyed. They have been co-ordinating aid efforts from the island of Cebu, 360 miles south of Manila. 
 
 "We have started a fund for donation and we managed to raise around 30,000," said Ms Agarwal. "The island is relatively small, with about 7,000 people. But the situation there is very devastating." ||||| Major relief packages have continued to pour into the typhoon-devastated city of Tacloban – from food aid to medicine and search-and-rescue teams – on the second day of a ramped-up effort by the Philippines government to reach those hardest hit by the super storm that many fear has killed more than 10,000 people. 
 
 The aid comes amid heightened insecurity and tension in the city, where reports of gunshots, stabbings and ambushes have caused many residents and aid workers to fear for their lives. 
 
 Local and American military C-130 planes were flying in with supplies on Thursday, while the USS George Washington, an aircraft carrier that can accommodate the landing of helicopters, was expected to arrive off the coast. 
 
 An American medical ship has been ordered but would not arrive for another few weeks. British digger maker JCB announced it would send heavy machinery and generators to help clear up the debris that still lines the streets. 
 
 Despite the arrival of aid and a concerted effort by the military to restore order to the town, thousands of stricken residents still crammed the crumbling airport desperate for a way out of the city that has borne the brunt of the storm and its aftermath. 
 
 On Wednesday night the Tacloban mayor, Alfred Romualdez, led a mass burial in a graveyard just outside the city. Officials said every effort had been made to ensure those buried could be identified in the weeks to come. 
 
 The official death toll of 2,357 is a considerably lower figure than that estimated by aid workers, who say the lack of information coming from various areas – some 29 municipalities in all are affected – could mean that the devastation is far greater than yet realised. Most casualties seem to have been around the islands of Samar and Leyte, where the storm first made landfall at 195mph on Friday morning, with accompanying sea surges of up to 20ft. 
 
 The resulting damage in the region – a coastal flatland that has seen whole villages blown apart by the storm's heavy winds and rain – has created a state of pandemonium in Tacloban, where survivors have had to loot shops and malls for water, while others have resorted to scavenging for food among the bloated bodies of the dead. 
 
 On Wednesday stories of heightened violence and tension circulated around the city as eight were killed after stampeding a rice warehouse looking for food. A Philippine Red Cross convoy was allegedly hijacked by armed men who were later shot dead by police, and a 13-year-old boy was knifed in the neck and stomach by unknown men, AFP reported. There were unverified reports that prisoners from the local jail, who had successfully broken out of their cells after the storm, were ambushing people carrying supplies across San Juanico bridge, which connects Tacloban with Samar island. 
 
 A Facebook status warning of traffickers posing as relief workers and targeting women and children circulated on Thursday but the Guardian was not able to verify the report. Officials urged people to stay calm and not believe everything they heard. "There have been so many reports of looting and rape which have turned out not to be correct," Ricky Caradang, a spokesman for President Benigno Aquino III, told the local ABS-CBN TV channel. 
 
 A nighttime curfew has been in place since Monday and in a televised report on Wednesday the BBC correspondent Rupert Wingfield-Hayes said Tacloban had turned into a "war zone". Footage showed tanks rolling through the centre of the devastated town and soldiers crouching behind walls with automatic rifles. Just what the threat was to the city had not been made clear, he said. 
 
 Some aid agencies, fearing for the safety of their employees, have ordered teams to evacuate. Plan International has withdrawn all 15 of its employees – normally permanently based in Tacloban – until security is restored in the city, according to spokesman Ian Wishart. The fact that many aid workers had arrived in Tacloban but little aid had yet been distributed was creating a security concern, one aid worker told the Guardian. A memo was circulating among relief workers advising them not to move around in Tacloban as some UN staff had already been pulled out for security reasons. 
 
 But officials have pointed to an increased presence of police and military, and the arrival of aid, as a turning point for the ravaged city. 
 
 Carandang said 26 of 138 barangays (neighbourhoods) in Tacloban had received aid, with many of the roads previously blocked by fallen trees and debris now cleared. 
 
 Oxfam has sent enough emergency water supplies for 20,000 families in Tacloban on a first-run delivery of effort, although the charity added that delivery was dependent on a stable security situation in the town itself. 
 
 Plans are to provide half a million people affected by the super storm with emergency shelter, water and construction materials to rebuild their homes and boats. The World Food Programme successfully delivered nearly 25 tonnes of high-energy biscuits on Wednesday and another 10 tonnes were on their way, the UN body said. 
 
 Much of the devastation wrought by Haiyan occurred in the Philippines' agricultural belt, with the majority of residents in Leyte and Samar working on farms or as fishermen. ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption The BBC's Rupert Wingfield-Hayes: "Progress is being made" 
 
 The relief operation in the central Philippines to help those affected by Typhoon Haiyan is making progress following the arrival of a US aircraft carrier and its escort of two cruisers. 
 
 More victims are receiving help but a BBC correspondent at the scene says there is still no large-scale food distribution taking place. 
 
 The first mass burials have been carried out in Tacloban. 
 
 The confirmed death toll, more than 2,300, is expected to continue rising. 
 
 More than 11 million people have been affected by the typhoon, according to the UN. 
 
 Unprecedented 
 
 The top US commander in the Philippines told the BBC that US military support would be on an unprecedented scale. 
 
 The USS George Washington, carrying 5,000 crew and moored off the east of Samar island, will expand search-and-rescue operations and provide a platform for helicopters to move supplies, the White House said. 
 
 Two US destroyers are already in the Philippines and other US vessels are expected to arrive in about a week, the US Navy said. 
 
 Pallets loaded with food and water have been taken from the aircraft carrier to Tacloban, the capital of badly hit Leyte province, and Guiuan, which was also devastated by the typhoon, on Samar's east coast. 
 
 Image caption The big international aid operation is being given a further boost by the arrival of a US aircraft carrier 
 
 Image caption Survivors have been forming long queues in the worst hit areas to collect food and water 
 
 Image caption Aid officials are trying to gain a more accurate picture of the typhoon damage from the air 
 
 Image caption Many buildings were flattened by the storm and others heavily damaged including this church in Tacloban 
 
 US Marine Brigadier General Paul Kennedy told BBC Radio 5 live that the US aid effort was being stepped up to a level that has "probably never been applied" to a humanitarian crisis. 
 
 The presence of the USS George Washington is expected to triple the number of available helicopters, which can also deliver hundreds of thousands of gallons of water every day. 
 
 Food, water and medical help are beginning to reach residents of Tacloban as soldiers clear roads blocked by debris. 
 
 But thousands of people continued to line up at the city's airport on Thursday to escape the difficult conditions. 
 
 Aid at a glance Asian Development Bank: $500m (£312m) emergency loans and $23m in grants Australia: A$30m ($28m, £17m) package, including aircraft, medical staff, shelter materials, water containers and hygiene kits China: 10m yuan ($1.6m; £1m) in relief goods plus $200,000 (£120,000) from government and Red Cross European Commission: $11m (£6.8m) Indonesia: Logistical aid including aircraft, food, generators and medicine Japan: $10m (£6.2m), including tents and blankets. Pledged up to 1,000 soldiers, 25-person medical team already sent South Korea: $5m (£3.1m) plus a 40-strong medical team UAE: $10m (£6.2m) in humanitarian aid UK: $32m (£20m) aid package, sending aircraft carrier, destroyer and large transport aircraft US: $20m (£12.4m) in humanitarian aid, 300 military personnel, aircraft carrier and other ships, military aircraft plus logistics support Donate to the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) In pictures: Aid ramps up Typhoon Haiyan: Aid in numbers Q&A: Haiyan disaster management 
 
 Many of the dozens of bodies which have been lying in the open since Haiyan struck are now being cleared from the streets and buried. 
 
 The first of several hundred bodies were interred in a mass grave in Tacloban after samples were taken to enable identification, the authorities told AP. 
 
 Philippine Health Minister Enrique Ona told the BBC that international criticism of the government's relief efforts was "unkind". 
 
 He said the final death toll was likely to be "significantly lower" than an early estimate of 10,000, but warned that it was unlikely all victims would be identified. 
 
 Looting 
 
 The full extent of what is needed to help survivors has yet to emerge as aid workers struggle to reach more isolated areas. 
 
 Guiuan, a town of 45,000, was heavily damaged by the typhoon. French aid charity MSF described the situation there as bleak. 
 
 But the BBC's Andrew Harding, reporting from near Guiuan, says after earlier problems with looting, some supplies are now getting in. 
 
 Other countries have also pledged help in the shape of financial aid, relief supplies or emergency teams. 
 
 The UK government is sending the aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious, more than £20m ($32m) in aid, a team of medical experts and an RAF transport aircraft. 
 
 China's latest pledge of $1.6m still looks pointedly small besides its previous aid packages to other nations - even to Japan, with whom it is also squabbling over territory China's aid controversy 
 
 Japan is also preparing to send up to 1,000 troops as well as naval vessels and aircraft, Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera said. 
 
 China - which is engaged in a territorial dispute with the Philippines - is sending 10m yuan ($1.6m; £1m) in relief goods. 
 
 Its initial pledge of $200,000 (£120,000) from the government and Chinese Red Cross combined drew criticism in US media, but was also condemned by some Chinese internet users as excessive. 
 
 Unprecedented logistics 
 
 Typhoon Haiyan, one of the most powerful storms ever recorded on land, hit the Philippines last Friday. 
 
 Tacloban's airport was left in ruins by the storm, but in recent days US military planes have been arriving with World Food Programme supplies. A French-Belgian field hospital has also been set up. 
 
 Manila sent troops to Tacloban to keep law and order, but correspondents say there is a growing sense of panic. 
 
 In some areas survivors have resorted to digging up water pipes and extracting fuel from reservoirs at petrol stations. 
 
 Health experts have warned that the worst-affected areas are entering a peak danger period for the spread of infectious diseases. ||||| The few doctors here said they've been treating cuts, fractures and pregnancy complications but expect to face more serious problems soon. 
 
 Residents stand next to grafitti requesting aid in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan. As many as 10,000 people are feared dead in the strongest typhoon to hit the Philippines this year. (Photo: Kevin Frayer, Getty Images) Story Highlights The risk of waterborne diseases such as cholera will increase 
 
 Getting in good clean water is a priority, said U.N. 
 
 The government says planes, ships and trucks were on their way with help 
 
 MANILA — Hundreds of injured people, pregnant women, children and the elderly have been crowding into a small building behind the control tower of this city's airport, one of the few places to find medical care here. 
 
 The few doctors here said Wednesday they've been treating cuts, fractures and pregnancy complications but expect that soon they will be faced with more serious problems such as pneumonia, dehydration, diarrhea and infections. 
 
 "Certainly there are many people who had chronic illnesses before this disaster struck who need to be taken to the medical treatment center that area still working," said Mathias Eick, Regional Information Officer, East, Southeast Asia and the Pacific, European Commission- Directorate General for Humanitarian and Civil Protection. 
 
 "You have the elderly, small children, babies who are being born, there are many things." 
 
 But because there is no clean running water, he said, the risk of waterborne diseases such as cholera will increase and that could cause serious trouble. 
 
 "You have people sleeping out in the open, so malaria or dengue could be a threat," he said. "There are thousands of injured people who need medical treatment, and many of the medical facilities have also been damaged so they are working under very truing circumstances." 
 
 Getting in good clean water is a priority, said U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos after touring Tacloban. 
 
 Very little aid has arrived in the city because of clogged roads, broken bridges and ports, and an airport that until today was not able to operate at night given the electricity went out on the Friday that the typhoon hit and has not been restored. Power generators were flooded as well. 
 
 Most of the aid is stuck in Manila and the nearby airport of Cebu, a 45-minute flight away. 
 
 "There's a lot of dead bodies outside. There's no water, no food," said Dr. Victoriano Sambale, one of the dozen medical workers tending to thousands of people at the airport clinic. 
 
 Until Wednesday there was no anesthetic. 
 
 "Patients had to endure the pain," Sambale said. 
 
 Clutching her swollen belly, 26-year-old Reve Rose was writhing on her side on a wooden bench as her husband looked on. Her first child was not due until around Christmas, but she feared she was in labor already. Sambale felt her belly and tried to calm her down, certain it was just a panic attack. 
 
 "I am nervous, sad," she said. "The house is lost. Everything is gone." 
 
 Thelma Superable, 74, was vomiting and needed emergency dialysis. She, her 51-year-old son, Danny Superable, and his young son have made their way to the clinic from their home, 20 miles away, by walking and hitching rides. 
 
 "I am trembling because I am hungry," Danny Superable said. "It's survival of the fittest." 
 
 The government says planes, ships and trucks were on their way with generators, water-purifying kits and emergency lights. The U.S. military said it was installing equipment to allow the damaged Tacloban airport to operate at night. 
 
 Rick said more doctors and medical help is needed but there will be a great need to fly people in serious distress. The Belgian government was setting up a field hospital hospital Wednesday with doctors and nurses who can help with basic health needs, he said. 
 
 "But certainly more chronic or serious cases will have to be evacuated from the zone and taken somewhere where there are still functioning health institutions," he said. 
 
 But it could all be overwhelmed with an epidemic of diseases from people drinking dirty water and exposure to filth. 
 
 "There could be other threats from especially the lack of proper sanitation facilities, children in the open getting chronic coughs or lung infections," he said. "All these issues are a threat to the population at the moment." 
 
 Contributing: The Associated Press 
 
 Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1cp4Zyo ||||| MANILA — Five days after Typhoon Haiyan ripped through the central Philippines, panic was spreading Wednesday and parched, hungry residents were resorting to increasingly desperate measures, including breaking into the homes of the dead. 
 
 Eight people were crushed to death when a huge crowd stormed a rice warehouse near Tacloban, one of the worst-hit cities, authorities said. More than 100,000 bags of rice were carted away in the melee, according to news reports Wednesday. 
 
 Elsewhere, residents dug up underground pipes and smashed them open to get water. 
 
 PHOTOS: Central Philippines devastated by Typhoon Haiyan 
 
 The official death toll stood at 2,275, but aid workers feared it would continue to grow. The United Nations estimates that more than 11 million people were affected by the storm, one of the most powerful ever to make landfall. 
 
 As concerns grew about rampant looting and lawlessness, Philippine security forces sent reinforcements and imposed a nighttime curfew in Tacloban. Armed assailants have been holding up aid convoys headed to the city. On Tuesday, troops killed two suspected communist rebels who attacked one such convoy, the military said. 
 
 Local officials said bands of looters, having cleaned out shops in Tacloban, were beginning to break into the homes of people who had died or fled the city. But there were reports that newly arrived troops were restoring order. 
 
 Flights delivering aid from around the world are arriving at the airport in Cebu, which has been turned into a logistics hub for the relief effort. The many donations included a field hospital from Belgium and a portable purification plant from Germany, according to European officials. 
 
 By the end of the day Wednesday, the United States had delivered nearly 274,000 pounds of supplies to Tacloban, about 100 miles northeast of Cebu, said two senior Obama administration officials who briefed reporters in Washington on condition of anonymity. The shipments included plastic tarps, hygiene kits, blankets and medical supplies. 
 
 U.S. military personnel had also evacuated about 800 people from Tacloban to Manila for medical treatment. 
 
 Philippine welfare personnel loaded up packages of rice and canned food provided by the World Food Program and distributed them to nearly 50,000 Tacloban residents. But even there, where the bulk of assistance has been delivered, bodies still lined the streets because, authorities said, there were not enough hands to remove them. 
 
 Hundreds of additional Marines are expected to arrive in the Philippines by week's end to bolster the relief effort, which has struggled against logistical hurdles and the scale of the devastation. 
 
 Aid has yet to reach many victims of the typhoon, known by Filipinos as Yolanda, particularly on outlying islands. 
 
 "The major challenge is logistics," said Mathias Eick, a regional spokesman for the European Commission's humanitarian aid directorate. "With all this aid arriving and at the same time, the various Philippine authorities — military, civilian structures, the Philippine Red Cross — trying to distribute aid to so many communities ... obviously there are bottlenecks." 
 
 Some of the logistical problems eased Wednesday, as remote airstrips and major roads were cleared of debris. However, fuel shortages and lack of power remain problems in rural areas. 
 
 The longer the aid takes to arrive, the more people try to leave. Every day, desperate residents gather at Tacloban airport hoping for a spot on one of the departing supply planes. 
 
 "It's a very natural decision to take," Eick said. "However, that of course makes it difficult for aid agencies to find out where people are going to, where people are staying, and how much is needed in the various towns." 
 
 With much of the aid headed to Tacloban, on the island of Leyte, concern is growing for other hard-hit communities, such as the port of Ormoc. 
 
 "There is enough food in Ormoc for about two or three days, but if aid doesn't come through soon ... the situation could descend into chaos," said Julien Anseau, a spokesman for the U.S.-based aid group ChildFund International. "What we are seeing is aid coming into Ormoc, but it's not staying in Ormoc, it's going on to Tacloban." 
 
 An assessment team from the international aid group Doctors Without Borders visited Guiuan, in Eastern Samar province, where the typhoon first made landfall. 
 
 "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," team leader Alexis Moens said in a statement. "The needs are immense, and there are a lot of surrounding villages that are not yet covered by any aid organizations." 
 
 Defending the relief effort, Philippine Cabinet Secretary Rene Almendras said Wednesday that major roads have been cleared of debris and authorities have reached all but four affected areas to assess the needs. Additional logistics hubs are being established in Ormoc and at an airstrip in Guiuan. 
 
 Aid deliveries will accelerate, Almendras told reporters. "It's just we have not seen anything on the magnitude that we are talking now." 
 
 Amid the devastation, there were heartwarming moments of resilience. Daryl Dano flew from Manila to Tacloban to search for her family, whom she found alive. When she arrived in the morning, she said residents were busy sifting through the vast fields of debris for anything they could salvage. But at night, she said, she was amazed to see people light a bonfire and gather in a circle to sing. 
 
 "They were sitting like Boy Scouts, sharing survival stories and what they did," she said. "They were sometimes even making jokes about the destruction around them. 
 
 "I asked them why or how they could laugh?" she said. A person replied, "I just have to think happy thoughts. This is my second life. I just have to move on from this point to the next." 
 
 [For the Record, 11:47 a.m. PST Nov. 14: In an earlier version of this post, Mathias Eick's last name was incorrectly given as Rick.] 
 
 alexandra.zavis@latimes.com 
 
 De Leon is a special correspondent.
– Help is finally beginning to reach hundreds of thousands of people struggling to survive in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan. The USS George Washington and two US cruisers have arrived in the Philippines and will distribute food, water, and medicine, as well as assist search and rescue operations in what the top US commander in the Philippines tells the BBC will be an American aid effort on an unprecedented scale. US planes are bringing in supplies and a medical ship is on the way; Britain is also sending an aircraft carrier, notes the BBC. In other developments: Supplies from the US and other countries are arriving, but some areas are still in desperate need of relief and "the major challenge is logistics," a European Commission spokesman tells the LA Times. "With all this aid arriving and at the same time, the various Philippine authorities—military, civilian structures, the Philippine Red Cross—trying to distribute aid to so many communities ... obviously there are bottlenecks." Lawlessness in the devastated city of Tacloban is also slowing the distribution of aid, the Guardian finds. A Red Cross convoy was allegedly hijacked by armed men and there are rumors that inmates who escaped during the storm have been ambushing people carrying supplies. Communist rebels have declared a ceasefire in disaster areas, but troops say there has been at least one attack. Some 2,357 people have been confirmed dead, but the toll is expected to rise significantly as remote areas hit hard by the storm are reached. In Tacloban, where bodies are being trucked to mass graves, the city administrator says he is sticking by his original estimate of 10,000 dead in the city alone. In a smaller city south of Tacloban, the devastation is even worse and a 16-member medical team from California is laboring in extreme conditions to help survivors, NBC finds. The volunteer surgeons—working by flashlight in Tanawan's ruined town hall—believe the region will need help for months. "I don’t know when or how we are going to be able to leave," one doctor says. "This is just the beginning of a wave of misery." USA Today has more on that front: The few doctors in Manila are already overwhelmed with hundreds of patients—and those are mostly minor injuries. They're soon expecting to see big problems like pneumonia, diarrhea, infections, and dehydration. And the New York Times looks at a hospital in Tacloban that has no power, where victims lay waiting for care. Food, water, and medical supplies are short; one patient interviewed by the Times says he has not received painkillers, antibiotics, or even an antiseptic for his wounds.