Earthquake survivors in Turkey and Syria face a 'mind-boggling' disaster. Here's how you can help

Lucas Bozzo was working and living in Gaziantep, Turkey when two massive earthquakes struck the region on Monday. 

The fallout has left many on the ground without proper shelter, adequate food and clean water, Bozzo, who was raised in Toronto, told CBC News. Makeshift tent cities full of people who have been displaced from their homes have formed amid aftershocks and frigid weather. 

"It's difficult to assess what the needs are because they're changing," Bozzo said.

"There's a need for food and water, then blankets, heaters, gas. And it's all dependent on the locale that's under consideration." 

He's appealing to Canadians to do whatever they can to help survivors that are in desperate need of aid.

Officials in Turkey have said that at least 13.5 million people are affected. The quakes have impacted millions more in northwestern Syria. Relief efforts in that region have been complicated by the ongoing civil war.

Local organizations like GlobalMedic Disaster Relief in Etobicoke, have spent the week doing everything they can to raise funds and gather essential items to send to affected regions.

Rahul Singh, GlobalMedic's executive director, told CBC Toronto getting as much aid to the area as possible.

"It's mind boggling, the catastrophic scale of this," he said.

"And the key is to decentralize and get out there into different areas and provide life sustaining aid like clean drinking water, shelter, food, access to healthcare, all the basics that people need." 

GlobalMedic has a number of field hospitals and shelters set up in Turkey already, Singh said. The organization is making getting clean water to kitchens a priority so they can provide people with safe food.

Singh outlined a number of ways people in Ontario can help their efforts, the first of which is to visit the GlobalMedic website to donate money.

He's also calling on people to volunteer to help put relief packages together and to amplify GlobalMedic's efforts on social media.

Marwa Khobeih, executive director for the Syria Canadian Foundation in Mississauga, told CBC Toronto the situation for people in northern Syria is even more dire because they've been abandoned by their government.