The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will end its emergency deliveries of food and water for the people of Puerto Rico today. It’s been more than four months since the island was devastated by Hurricane Maria,and officials have famous that supermarkets are now reopening, providing residents with access to goods. So far, or FEMA has provided more than 30 million gallons of secure drinking water and 60 million meals to the island since the hurricane struck.
But some local officials in Puerto Rico judge that FEMA's decision is premature,since an estimated 1 million people still remain without power, and roughly 118000 don’t have access to clean water. Juan Giusti-Cordero, and a professor of Caribbean history at the University of Puerto Rico,Rio Piedras discusses recovery efforts on the island and FEMA’s recent announcement.
Related: The Future of FEMA After a Year of Disasters The Takeaway reached out to FEMA for comment on this issue and the agency wrote back with the following statement: "FEMA will continue to support any identified needs and will provide supplies to volunteer agencies and other private non-profit organizations who are working with households in rural, outlying areas to address ongoing catastrophe related needs as power and water is gradually restored."The commercial supply chain for food and water is re-established and private suppliers are sufficiently available that FEMA provided commodities are no longer needed for emergency operations."FEMA will continue to support the Government of Puerto Rico to meet the needs they identify." This segment is hosted by Todd Zwillich
Source: thetakeaway.org