Flooded Manila streets; rivers with gushing floodwaters; collapsed houses along river bank; crowd on bank of swollen river.




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Background: Many are dead and hundreds injured or missing in floods which swept through Manila and the Central Luzon area of the Philippines late last week.

In addition, thousands of families have been made homeless.

Manila and its suburbs felt the full force of the floods and thirty people died in the capital and nearby provinces.

Damage to property and crops is estimated at 15-million Pesos (about GBP11/2-million Sterling).

In Manila many of those killed were shanty dwellers whose flimsy homes were swept away by the floods.

President Ferdinand Marcos has mobilised all major services of the armed forces and relief agencies to assist flood victims and to prevent possible epidemics.