[Asia Economy Reporter Kwon Haeyoung] A pessimistic forecast has emerged that the death toll from the massive earthquake that struck T?rkiye on the 6th (local time) could exceed 100,000.
According to a report released on the 10th by the United States Geological Survey (USGS), the probability that the death toll from this earthquake will exceed 100,000 is estimated at 24%. Initially, immediately after the earthquake, the possibility of more than 100,000 deaths was estimated at 0%. Two days ago, the probability jumped to 14%, and then rose again by 10 percentage points.
USGS presented the probability that the death toll will be between 10,000 and 100,000 as 35%, raising the previous estimate (30%) by 5 percentage points.
In fact, the number of deaths caused by the earthquake is rapidly increasing. According to Germany's DPA news agency, the total number of deaths in both T?rkiye and Syria has surpassed 21,000. Turkish authorities announced that 17,674 people have died in their country alone, while 3,377 deaths were reported in neighboring Syria. This figure greatly exceeds the death toll of 18,500 from the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, which had a magnitude of 9.0.
The number of injured reported so far is 75,000, including a significant number of seriously injured.
Furthermore, the economic losses caused by the earthquake are expected to be enormous. USGS estimated that losses could reach up to 10% of T?rkiye's Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The probability that losses will range between 10 billion and 100 billion dollars (approximately 12.6 trillion to 126.4 trillion Korean won) is 35%, and the probability that losses will exceed 100 billion dollars is 33%. These figures represent increases of 1 percentage point and 9 percentage points, respectively, compared to previous estimates.
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