The human toll from this week's earthquake in northern Algeria has risen to 1,875 dead and 8,081 injured, the country's interior ministry said today.
Prime Minister Ahmed Ouyahia warned Friday: "The toll, will, alas, get worse."
Many people were listed as still missing, believed trapped in buildings that collapsed in the shock.
At least 1,110 dead and 2,628 injured were recorded in the Boumerdes area, 50 kilometers east of the capital Algiers, which was worst hit by the quake.
In Algiers itself, 638 people have been found to have died and 4,523 to be injured so far.
In other regions rescuers have found 11 dead and 707 injured under rubble.
Mr Ouyahia said today that rescue services were working frantically to find possible survivors as the number of firefighters involved in the operations surged from 1,900 to 5,000 today.
Algerian rescuers which include members of the military were being assisted by at least 300 aid crews from overseas.
Yesterday about a dozen people had been rescued alive from the rubble.
Mr Ouyahia admitted that rescue operations were difficult given the damage done by the quake but said Algerians should be patient as the government would "control the situation by next week".
Tent villages accommodating homeless survivors would be set up soon, he added.
State radio said authorities feared epidemics as temperatures were rising rapidly with the onset of summer.
Intense heat - temperatures reached 30 degrees Celsius this morning - would force authorities to call in army bulldozers to clear the rubble quickly to reduce the chance of epidemics but slashing any chance of survival for those buried by collapsed buildings.
AFP