Landslides and floods that hit southeastern Brazil a week ago have killed at least 65 people, according to the latest official death toll released by authorities late Sunday.

“So far we have confirmed 65 deaths,” Sao Paulo state authorities said, specifying that “17 women, 21 men and 19 children” have been identified at this stage.

More than 680mm of rain fell in 24 hours at the end of last week in San Sebastião, a seaside resort 200km from Sao Paulo, in other words twice the monthly average rainfall there and the most ever recorded in any location in the country. Brazil in history, according to the authorities.

After the discovery of the body of the 65th victim on Sunday afternoon, rescue teams ended the search in the Vila Sai neighborhood of San Sebastián, the area that suffered the hardest hit, according to the Globo News television news network, which cited sources close to the political protection.

The Sao Paulo government did not respond when AFP tried to contact it to ask if investigations were continuing in other locations.

Over 2,400 residents are homeless.

The governor of Sao Paulo, Tarquisio de Freitas, admitted last Thursday that the SMS warning system to residents could not have prevented the tragedy. He promised that sirens would be installed in high-risk areas and that new housing would be built for the homeless.

Experts attribute the destruction, the abundance of this nature that the largest state in Latin America has experienced in recent years, to the consequences of climate change and uncontrolled urbanization.

9.5 million Brazilians live in areas exposed to the risk of landslides or flooding, many of them in favelas — slums — that lack basic infrastructure such as drainage, the country’s National Disaster Warning and Monitoring Center (Centro Nacional de Monitoring and Alerts of Natural Disasters, CEMADEN).