YANGON, Myanmar - The official death toll from Myanmar's devastating May 2-3 cyclone has jumped to nearly 78,000, state television reported Friday, marking an increase of about 35,000 over just a day earlier.

The number of missing doubled to 55,917, after being reported as 27,838 for most of the past week. The report also updated the number of injured to nearly 20,000.

The new cyclone death toll of 77,738 is substantially higher than that suffered by all but one country from the December 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. Indonesia had more than 130,000 dead and 37,000 missing from that disaster.

The Red Cross said Wednesday it believed the total cyclone death toll may be as high as 127,990. The United Nations has said more than 100,000 may have died in Myanmar, the Southeast Asian country also known as Burma.

The state TV announcement implied that the latest casualty toll may be close to the final figure.

"The national disaster management committee carried out search and rescue and relief work and collection of data, promptly, immediately and extensively after the cyclone," it said.

"However, due to the cyclone aftermath and inclement weather, the figure of dead, missing and injured was finalized on May 15."

The announcement said there were 159 civil servants among the dead and 58 among the missing.

The UN and the Red Cross say 1.6 million to 2.5 million people are in urgent need of food, water and shelter.

The United Nations also said Friday that severe restrictions imposed by Myanmar's military junta have left aid agencies largely in the dark about the extent of survivors' suffering, two weeks after the deadly storm.

John Holmes, UN undersecretary general for humanitarian affairs, will go to Myanmar on Sunday to try to convince junta leaders to grant more access for UN relief workers and massively scale up aid efforts, said Amanda Pitt, a UN spokeswoman in Bangkok, Thailand.

Some foreign diplomats have been invited by the regime to visit the hard-hit Irrawaddy delta on Saturday, said Shari Villarosa, the top U.S. diplomat in Yangon. She did not provide details.

It is not clear how much access the diplomats will have outside the conducted tour. Still, it will be the first time diplomats will be seeing first hand the effects of the cyclone as well as the highly criticized relief delivery effort by the government.

Officials of various UN agencies called a news conference in Bangkok to give an update on their relief operations. But the most basic data was missing - from the number of orphans to the extent of diseases and the number of refugee camps.

They also couldn't say whether all survivors are in camps, on the move or still living in destroyed villages in the hardest-hit Irrawaddy delta, an area the size of Austria. Cyclone Nargis also pounded Yangon, Myanmar's main city.

"The risk increases with each passing day," Pitt said, referring to the vulnerability of survivors to outbreaks of disease and other problems.

Lack of clean water will be "the biggest killer" in Irrawaddy in the coming days, Thomas Gurtner, the head of operations for the international Red Cross, told The Associated Press in Geneva.

"To be able to provide clean water to hundreds of thousands of people stranded in the (Irrawaddy) delta requires a major operation, which we have neither the material, the logistical nor the staff capacity to do," he said.

Earlier, the World Health Organization said a few cases of cholera had been reported. But later Friday, WHO said Myanmar's Ministry of Health had not detected any cases.

The junta insists Myanmar nationals and government agencies, including the military, can handle relief operations, particularly aid distribution.

"We still have obstacles to relief workers getting to the delta region, which doesn't help," Pitt said. "We are concerned about the effects on the people. It is clear, from what everyone is saying, the aid effort is far from over."

The United Nations says the regime has issued 40 visas to its staffers and another 46 to nongovernment agencies but has confined the personnel to the immediate Yangon area.

Marshall, the UN official, laid out the hurdles that aid agencies face.

He said the military has set up checkpoints on the two main roads to the delta to keep foreigners out of the disaster zone. Even local staff have to negotiate with the military to gain access to the camps.

"Things will still get done, but they will not be done as effectively, efficiently or as quickly, which means delays, which means increasing risk in terms of health, security and in terms of longer-term rehabilitation and getting back to a normal lifestyle," he said.

The UN Children's Fund, or UNICEF, said Friday its fourth flight into Myanmar, scheduled for Saturday, would deliver several tonnes of food for malnourished children. Radio broadcasts are trying to help lost children find their families, it said.

"At the moment, it is a difficult to know how many children have been separated or unaccompanied. We still have no indication of how many orphans there may be," said Shantha Bloemen, a UNICEF spokeswoman.

In the absence of an organized relief effort by the government, ordinary people are stepping in, with shopkeepers handing out free rice porridge and medical students caring for the sick.

Daw Mya Win, a 49-year-old grocer in a Yangon suburb, cooks rice porridge every day to feed anyone who comes. She also sends pots of it to some of the thousands of homeless sheltering in Buddhist monasteries.

College students are going door-to-door, handing out a few pennies to families for rice.

"Whenever we distribute rice and clothing, I can see the faces of the cyclone victims light up. It is very rewarding to see them smile," said Nyi Nyi, 21.

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