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Eleven children were killed and 73 injured, 25 severely, when lightning struck their school on Thursday in the village of Bikoro, some 128 km south of the town of Mbandaka in northwestern Democratic Republic of the Congo, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported on Monday.
The school buildings, however, sustained practically no damage.
OCHA said that injuries consisted primarily of burns and effects of electric shock.
"The psychological effects of such a catastrophe on children aged between 12 and 16 years cannot be underestimated," OCHA said. "Psychological support is therefore indispensable and urgent, as there is not a single psychologist in the region."
Due to a shortage of beds in the local hospital, run by an order of the Sisters of St. Lazarus, two to three children were occupying one bed each, OCHA reported.
The lightning struck at about 1 p.m., hitting the Institut Mpimba, occupied by some 200 students.
Local government officials, the Congolese Red Cross, the UN Population Fund and international medical relief NGO Medecins Sans Frontieres were all contributing to the relief effort, OCHA said.
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