HEALTH CONCERNS

When rain batters the devastated areas again on Thursday, the flood waters could wash the debris and bodies down the Bailong River and cause more public health problems.

The Gansu provincial health department said health workers had finished sterilizing 171,075 square meters of the county seat and no disease outbreaks had been reported.

Disinfectant, public health workers and equipment were pouring in from nearly every city across the province to prevent disease outbreaks and ensure food and water safety, a provincial health spokesman said at a press conference Wednesday.

He said tonnes of garlic and Sichuan pepper -- which health experts believe are effective against epidemics -- have been shipped into the disaster-hit areas.

But public health remains a challenge in the coming days.

While immediate cremation of the recovered bodies would be best to prevent health problems, in Zhouqu County, where at least a third of the residents are Tibetans, traditional burial is still one of the most prevalent funeral customs.

"The locals are used to burial -- there is no operational crematorium in the county," said Sun Junlin, a villager who was helping rescuers carry bodies.

A crematorium had just been completed when the mudslide struck, but it was not yet working, he said.

"We encourage people to cremate the bodies of their deceased family members as soon as possible, but many people want to carry them home for a traditional burial," said Yang Yuqiong, a doctor at a local clinic.

Yang and her colleagues are extremely worried about disease in the area, which is hit alternately by blazing heat and rain.

"For days, the temperature has hovered over 35 degrees Celsius. The corpses would decay and endanger the health of the living," she said.