Nine days after a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Panama, the damage ledger keeps climbing. In its Report No. 15, covering assessments through Sunday morning, the national emergency agency SINAPROC says 7,933 homes have now been evaluated and 26,018 people affected, with 1,952 homes classified as total damage — up from 1,627 in the previous assessment. About 74 per cent of the evaluated homes are in the Herrera and Los Santos provinces.
The ground has not settled. A magnitude 5.0 aftershock struck the Tonosí region of Los Santos, and satellite analysis by Copernicus Sentinel-2 with the University of Panama's Institute of Geosciences has identified 2,351 landslides linked to the quake, including 1,445 concentrated near La Cabuya and Torio in the Veraguas–Los Santos corridor; officials caution the count is preliminary because of cloud cover. Damage has also been recorded to 576 educational facilities, 42 healthcare facilities, 44 churches, 87 public buildings and 69 roads and bridges. Among those affected are 85 pregnant women and 1,026 people with disabilities.
Shelter demand is growing rather than shrinking: 55 shelters are now housing about 3,827 people across six provinces and the Ngäbe-Buglé comarca, up from 46 shelters and 3,696 people in the earlier count, and rain has flooded some improvised shelters at Bombachito and El Ciruelito. UNICEF estimates roughly 8,300 children and adolescents need humanitarian assistance.
Recovery work has begun in Chiriquí, Veraguas, Herrera and Coclé, and electricity was restored to Isla Cañas in Los Santos after crews repaired a submarine cable damaged by the quake. No new damage assessment has yet been issued for the latest Tonosí aftershock.
