The death toll from a powerful earthquake in the central Philippines rose above 50 on Wednesday, with injured patients overwhelming hospitals on the island of Cebu.

The shallow magnitude 6.9 quake struck late Tuesday off the island’s northern end near Bogo, a city of 90,000 people, according to the US Geological Survey (USGS).

Injured children cried and adults screamed while receiving treatment on beds laid out beneath blue tents on the driveway of the Cebu Provincial Hospital in Bogo.

They had been wheeled out of the building amid fears of further harm as hundreds of aftershocks rocked the region overnight.

Nearby, hospital workers carried black body bags on stretchers into vans that will take them to local mortuaries, AFP journalists saw.

Up to 60 people are reported killed so far,

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