Save the Children plans to help rebuild Nepal’s lost infrastructure

Save the Children is preparing for the phase that begins after emergency aid groups leave Nepal’s flood-hit Nuwakot district. For now, its teams are distributing food, water, diapers and toothbrushes, but the organization says recovery will require much more than immediate relief.

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Once the story’s over, everybody’s going to fly out. The people who are left here are the communities whose homes have been washed away.

“Once the story’s over, everybody’s going to fly out,” said Amy Lefevre of Save the Children. “The people who are left here are the communities whose homes have been washed away.”

The organization has already started speaking with local authorities about rebuilding. Lefevre said survivors would soon need work, income and a way to rebuild their lives. “The next step will be, ‘I need a job, I need to rebuild my life, I need a livelihood,’” she said.

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The next step will be, ‘I need a job, I need to rebuild my life, I need a livelihood.’

Children’s education is another priority. “Children need to be back in school,” Lefevre said. “They need to be in education again.” Save the Children has also assigned psychosocial counselors to child-friendly spaces in temporary shelters, as children and families continue to process what happened.

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Children need to be back in school. They need to be in education again.

Lefevre said the psychological impact could be difficult for children to understand and express. “I think it’s really hard to comprehend how children are going to process this trauma and this event that they’ve lived through,” she said. Water contamination remains an immediate concern across much of the affected area, with residents warned not to bathe in the water sources.

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I think it’s really hard to comprehend how children are going to process this trauma and this event that they’ve lived through.