IT has been 12 days since the world was, quite literally, shaken by one of the biggest natural disasters of our time.

Aid work is underway and, little by little, those affected by the devastating tsunamis will begin to rebuild their lives and look to the future.

However, it is now our responsibility to guide those people into their new lives and, along the way, prove that our support is unconditional and relentless.

During the next few months, a second wave of misery will hit those people who have already been living on the brink since the Boxing Day disaster.

We will see survivors fighting for their lives, as infected water supplies spread killer diseases such as cholera, typhoid and malaria.

We must not desert these desperate people to fight this crisis alone.

The horror of what holidaymakers saw during the disaster will not leave them when they touch down in their respective countries and are reunited with their families.

But hundreds of thousands of people who live in South East Asia will not have the luxury of returning home or escaping the nightmare they have found themselves in - they have nothing and can go nowhere.

Life will go on - that is human nature - but life for millions will never be the same. This is a disaster that nobody will ever be able to comprehend - and something we should never forget.