"I was sleeping, but fled outside in panic. If I am going to die, I will die here. Just let it be," said Banda Aceh resident Kaspian, 26.

This provincial capital and other coastal parts of Aceh are still struggling after Sunday's quake and tsunami, which together killed nearly 48,000 Acehnese. Officials fear the death toll may climb to as high as 80,000 and leave a similar number homeless.

The city's airport was so busy with military and other flights full of much-needed food and medical supplies that some private charter planes were being told to stay away, but residents complained little of the food was getting to them.

Residents and some aid officials said so far distribution of the supplies seemed haphazard at best.

"We're confused about where to get the food. There's no information. Just what you hear on the street. The coordination is very bad," said Zulkarnaen, 36.

On one road's median strip, people who lost their homes Sunday camped under plastic sheeting, and rushed to a car as the occupants tried to distribute aid programme biscuits.

Soon dozens of people surrounded the vehicle, reaching inside to grab the food and rocking the car before it was finally able to get away.

"Some cars come by and throw food like that. The fastest get the food, the strong one wins. The elderly and the injured don't get anything. We feel like dogs," said Usman, 43.

There might be supplies elsewhere, but some in the makeshift camp were reluctant to search.

"We are too afraid to go along the streets. There might be more earthquakes. Last night my children cried. I was scared. We are all frightened more water will come," said Sarmina, 34.

Four days after the disaster, many bloated bodies of the dead had yet to be removed from where the tsunami flood left them in the Banda Aceh area, even though as the provincial capital it has been a centre of clean-up and aid efforts.

Medical experts say the rotting bodies pose health hazards, fouling water supplies and setting the stage for diseases like cholera.

More isolated parts of remote Aceh province, some 1,700 km (1,000 miles) northwest of Jakarta, have yet to be reached by any government officials or rescue efforts, and are expected to add substantially to the death toll.

A UN official has said his educated guess was that deaths in Indonesia might reach between 50,000 and 80,000.

More could die if the clean-up does not accelerate.

"Many people have illnesses such as respiratory problems, diarrhoea, skin irritations and cuts. There are still maybe thousands of bodies out there," Edward Sy, an Indonesian Red Cross senior field officer, told Reuters in Banda Aceh on Wednesday.

"If the bodies are not taken away, we will get sick from them," political activist Mustafa told Reuters.