Myanmar toll may be 150,000 

Aid agencies now say up to 150,000 people may have died in the Myanmar cyclone and they are battling to prevent disease and starvation pushing that figure even higher.

Help for the hundreds of thousands of survivors is still only trickling into the country.

The picture of devastation is only getting worse in the cyclone-ravaged nation.

It has become a race against time to prevent disease taking hold.

A hospital in the worst affected Irrawaddy Delta is without power and its staff are overwhelmed.

"The situation is really out of control. Too many patients and very little help. But we have to organise with the higher authority for food shelter and medicines, sanitation and clean water," says a doctor at the hospital.

The delta remains a wasteland with towns torn apart by the brutal force of Cyclone Nargis.

"No home is left in my village, all flattened. About two thirds of the villagers died. Only one third remain alive," says a woman survivor.

The ruling junta has been obsessed with planning a constitutional referendum and has put little thought or planning into aid distribution - Myanmar's ruling general, Than Shwe, was out to vote despite being invisible throughout the crisis.

The result of the referendum, which critics say is a foregone conclusion, could enshrine military dominance in Myanmar for decades.

In Mae Sot on the Thailand-Myanmar border, precious little aid is moving, but that may change.

The US Marines are flying in, one team of two dozen an element of thousands who were on annual exercises off Thailand when Cyclone Nargis struck.

US Marine Commander Colonel Mark Losack says they just happened to be there when the disaster occurred.

"We feel just horrible about that and have the deepest sympathies for the people of Burma and we hope we're going to be able to provide them with some relief supplies fairly quickly here," Losack says.

How quickly the relief supplies are distributed is not entirely up to the Marines. Despite having the world's mightiest military machine at their disposal, the Marines are like everyone else, waiting at the edges for word that they will be allowed to help a regime that has very little to do with foreigners.

They are assessing how well the airport could work as a forward staging post to bring and store aid and then fly it over the border.

"Hopefully we'll be able to make a decision, should be executing maybe next week," says Losack.

That's if they get an invitation. But if they don't, the death toll can only rise.

Those wishing to make a contribution to the cyclone relief effort can do so through various aid agencies. For details CLICK HERE