'Tens of thousands' may be dead, Mayotte hospital worker says

PARIS (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of people could have died in Mayotte after a devastating cyclone and doctors are also bracing for a surge in disease, a dental surgeon at the islands' only hospital said on Tuesday.

Three days after Cyclone Chido tore through the French overseas territory off East Africa, the hospital's emergency department has not seen large numbers of injured, leading them to fear the worst, Naouelle Bouabbas said.

"The fact that we don't see that many injured from the cyclone when everything has collapsed makes us think that all these people are still buried and are dead," she told Reuters in a video call from the islands.

"We expect thousands, tens of thousands would not surprise me," said Bouabbas, when asked about a possible death toll, adding there was no infrastructure in place yet to remove people from the rubble.

Authorities have said hundreds or even thousands could have died, but only 22 deaths had been confirmed on Tuesday morning, Ambdilwahedou Soumaila, the mayor of the capital Mamoudzou, told French radio.

The Red Cross said on Tuesday that about 100,000 people were unaccounted for, including about 200 of its volunteers, after the cyclone battered the islands with 200 kph (124 mph) winds in the worst storm in 90 years.

More than three-quarters of Mayotte's roughly 321,000 people live in relative poverty, and about one-third are estimated to be undocumented migrants, most from nearby Comoros and Madagascar. Many are living in makeshift shantytowns.

Bouabbas pointed to the living conditions for many of the residents of the islands as being behind the possible sharp rise in the death toll and potentially the spread of disease, concerns also raised by other officials.

"People are already thirsty and hungry. People are already drinking dirty water," said Bouabbas. "We feel very alone and we're afraid. We think the hardest part is yet to come," she said.

Medical facilities have also been damaged, including the central Mayotte hospital where she works, which was flooded, damaging equipment and cutting power, according to Bouabbas.

The hospital could not be reached for comment.

(Reporting by Lucien Libert. Additional reporting by Gabriel Stargardter in Paris and Cecile Mantovani in Geneva; Writing by Dominique Patton; Editing by Alison Williams)

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