Mexico rushes aid to millions after powerful quake; death toll at 96

JUCHITAN, Mexico (Reuters) - A powerful earthquake that struck Mexico last week has left some 2.5 million people in need of aid and killed 96 others, authorities said on Monday, as officials rushed to get food and water to stricken communities in the poor south.

Oaxaca state governor Alejandro Murat told local television the death toll in his state had risen to 76. He said preliminary reports showed that at least 12,000 homes were damaged, and warned the number was likely to rise.

Murat said 1 million people in Oaxaca needed food, water, electricity and help rebuilding damaged homes, while in neighboring Chiapas state, which was closest to the epicenter of the tremor, 1.5 million people were affected, according to officials.

“We are united in facing this humanitarian crisis,” Murat said.

The 8.1-magnitude quake off the coast of Chiapas rattled Mexico City and sowed destruction across the narrowest portion of Mexico on the isthmus of Tehuantepec.

Mexico’s government on Monday withdrew an offer to help victims of Hurricane Harvey in Texas after the quake stretched the resources of its emergency services. The government has been coping with heavy rains and the impact from Hurricane Katia on the Gulf state of Veracruz.

Sixteen people were reported killed in Chiapas state and four others in neighboring Tabasco from the quake. Many of the fatalities in Oaxaca were in the town of Juchitan, where more than 5,000 homes were destroyed.

Some trucks with government aid delivered bags of simple rations, mostly water and canned food on Sunday, but many residents complained about the slow pace of assistance.

Margarita Lopez, a 56-year-old domestic worker, lined up for help in one especially hard-hit neighborhood of Juchitan, where nearly every house was severely damaged in the quake.

The quake was the most powerful to hit Mexico in over eight decades and was stronger than a 1985 temblor that killed thousands in Mexico City. However, its greater depth and distance kept the capital from being more serious damaged.“Almost nothing has arrived from the government, and we don’t know what else we can do,” Lopez said.

Mexico’s national seismological institute said more than 1,000 aftershocks rattled the area.

Many residents were wary about returning to wobbly buildings hit by the initial tremor, instead sleeping in the open air in gardens, patios and in the street.

State-run oil company Pemex said on Monday it has not restarted its Salina Cruz refinery due to the aftershocks. Pemex shut down the refinery as a precaution following the quake.

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Citation

Garcia, David Alire. “Mexico President Leads Government Response in Quake Zone.” Reuters. Thomson Reuters. 11 Sept., 2017. <www.reuters.com/article/us-quake-mexico/mexico-rushes-aid-to-millions-after-powerful-quake-death-toll-at-96-idUSKCN1BM1ZG>.

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Response

The intended audience of Reuters is other news agencies (such as CNN, BBC, etc.) and as such its audience really is quite large. Because this article is about the earthquake in Mexico however, it seems likely that its intended audience would be white middle-class citizens of America who are close to the border and may be more impacted by the aftermath of this earthquake. Part of the article's audience may also be the many people in Texas who were affected by the hurricane there because Mexico will no longer be able to offer the support that they had intended to in that area. 

As a news agency that sells news and footage of events to other news agencies Reuters is largely unbiased in how it presents news as it desires to sell news to both left leaning and right leaning news agencies. As a result, Reuters does a brilliant job of presenting 'just the facts' insomuch as can be hoped for. Despite this Reuters still tends to have a little bit of a left leaning slant. 

Because David Alire Garcia, the author of the article, is from Mexico it is likely that he would have bias towards his country, however through the article this bias does not appear to have a profound impact on how he presented the information. An impact that this could have that readers would not be able to discern would be that the information that he is presenting and the information that he is withholding could be influenced by his bias.

I think that the article brings up a very interesting point when it mentions how because this disaster has occurred in Mexico stretching the resources of the Mexican government they will no longer be able to provide the support for Texas and the aftermath from Hurricane Harvey there. This among other things is probably most of the international significance that this article has because US is stretching itself to provide aid to both Florida and Texas and help from Mexico would have been much appreciated. I think that this will also have some impact on the UN or other international aid organizations as there is another disaster to deal with now and attempt to clean up.