MANILA, Philippines—The death toll from Typhoon Haiyan that struck the central Philippines on Nov. 8 has passed 6,000 with nearly 1,800 people missing, officials said Friday.

Twenty-seven bodies, all unidentified, were among the latest to be recovered under debris in typhoon-stricken coastal areas including the hardest hit city of Tacloban, said Maj. Reynaldo Balido, the spokesman for the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.


Balido said that 20 to 30 bodies were still being found every day. Identifying cadavers in the advanced stage of decomposition and matching them with the missing is a difficult process and the reason why the number of the missing remains unchanged, he said.

The homes of more than 16 million people also were either flattened or damaged by the typhoon, and officials said rebuilding will take at least three years.

