BEIRUT, Feb 9 (NNN-NNA) – Lebanese authorities, yesterday, started to ease the total lockdown measures in the country, for the fight against COVID-19, due to the economic and financial crisis.
Lebanese authorities adopted a strategy, aimed at opening the different sectors in the country, in four phases, to avoid big gatherings and a further increase in the number of infections, which have reached 319,917 so far, with 3,616 deaths from the virus.
Banks and supermarkets opened their doors to clients, prompting people to stand in long queues to withdraw money and buy their needs after over three weeks of total lockdown. Most people were wearing masks without proper respect for social distancing measures.
During the first phase, banks, supermarkets, public sector, in addition to public transport, will resume operations, while other sectors, including car companies, travel agencies and trade, will open later this month.
Representatives of the different sectors in the country have been calling upon authorities to curb lockdown measures and allow them to operate, to be able to survive amid the deteriorating economic situation.
Khaled Itani, a citizen who works at a clothes shop in Hamra, said that he is glad the government has come up with a strategy to open the country, during the current tough economic situation. “We cannot stay at home. We want to work and earn money to live,” he said.
Meanwhile, Hassib Frayha, an owner of a clothes shop in Hamra, said,he cannot wait to open his business again so as to generate some income.
Meanwhile, experts in the country expressed their concern about the government plan to reduce lockdown measures, amid continuous increase in infections.
Firas Abiad, director of the Rafic Hariri University Hospital, said, extending the lockdown for another week is preferable, because the positive rate of COVID-19 has remained stubbornly high, at 20 percent, which means the virus is still actively spreading in the community.
Abiad noted that easing the lockdown will result in reversing any downward trend and numbers will quickly rebound. He added, the current rate of more than 2,500 new cases daily is not allowing hospitals to cope with the situation.
Abiad admits that extending lockdown is not a popular decision, which will lead to suffering, but the premature easing of restrictions will yield worse results.
For his part, Nasser Yassin, a professor of policy and planning at the American University of Beirut, expressed his concern about “the high positivity rate of PCR tests at 22 percent, which is one of the highest in the world and it does not encourage the re-opening of the businesses and institutions.”
He noted that the World Health Organisation is not in favour of resuming various sectors’ operations in a country, unless the test positivity rate drops to five percent of less.
Yassin is also concerned about the low number of people who registered for vaccination, which stands at 248,000 only with 70,000 workers in the health sector, equivalent to only 6.5 percent of the total population. “This is a very low percentage compared to the desired goal to achieve community immunity at 80 percent,” he said.
HE also noted that 37 percent of Lebanese families (370,000 families) applied for financial support at the Social Affairs Ministry, which indicates that the total lockdown will not yield positive results, if it is not accompanied with financial support for all these families.
Social Affairs Minister, Ramzi Musharrafieh, noted that, the World Bank’s loan of 264 million U.S. dollars will only cover 147,000 families.
Yassin emphasised the importance of expanding the capacity of hospitals in the coming days, while also launching an awareness campaign, about the importance of vaccination, in addition to adopting a proper vaccination strategy, to vaccinate 80 percent of the people in a timely manner.
Lebanon is expected to receive the first batch of Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines by the end of this week or the beginning of next week.
