The cyclone, the worst natural disaster to hit the area since the 2004 tsunami which devastated the region, battered Myanmar on May 2, killing at least 134,000 people and affecting another 2.5 million.
An emergency meeting of foreign ministers from the 10 countries that make up the Association of Southeast Asian Nations decided on Monday to hold a donor conference in Yangon, Myanmar's former capital and its biggest city, with the UN on May 25, Singapore's foreign minister, George Yeo said.
"This mechanism will facilitate the effective distribution and use of assistance from the international community, including the expeditious and effective deployment of relief workers, especially health and medical personnel," the Straits Times newspaper also cited Yeo as saying.
Asia's regional bloc has also agreed that each member-state will send a team of 30 medical personnel into Myanmar 'very soon,' said Indonesian Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda.
Although aid has begun to trickle through to the disaster-hit country, many aid organizations have complained that distribution is being delayed by the military junta, who are reluctant to permit foreigners into the worst-hit areas.
The risk of epidemic is now critical due to the lack of clean drinking water and poor sanitary conditions caused by the sheer amount of uncollected rotting corpses strewn over the country's towns and villages.
