Covid-19: the situation is becoming catastrophic in Lebanese hospitals
Audio 01:19
The intensive care unit of the Rafic Hariri University Hospital in Beirut.
RFI / Noé Pignède
Text by: RFI Follow
5 mins
Lebanon is facing an increase in the number of coronavirus cases.
In the midst of the economic crisis, and while several hospitals in Beirut were damaged by the double explosion at the port on August 4, the hospital system is struggling to cope with the pandemic.
Report in the intensive care unit of Rafic Hariri hospital in Beirut, the main center for Covid patients in the country.
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With our correspondent in Beirut,
Noé Pignède
To enter this service dedicated to patients seriously affected by the coronavirus, the combination is mandatory.
In the middle of the machines, the patients are plunged into an artificial coma.
The intensive care unit has been full for several days.
Sylvana Leihel is the nurse in charge of the service.
“
Here we have 10 patients.
Nine of them are intubated.
They are heavy, serious patients, not stable at all.
"
► Read also: Lebanon: 111 towns and villages cordoned off to try to curb the Covid-19
The only patient still conscious calls out to the nurse.
A cry of distress muffled by his oxygen mask.
“
He wants to go home, he doesn't want to stay here.
In front of him, a 34-year-old woman has just been placed on a ventilator by Doctor Saïd Asmar.
“
Unfortunately, she is young,”
says the doctor.
She was pregnant.
We were able to bring her child into the world, but then her condition deteriorated.
Yesterday we had to put her on oxygen.
We have an increase in critically ill patients.
We have been working 24 hours a day since February, and the situation is getting worse.
At the moment, she's still under control, but I don't know for how long.
Now we have patients who come to the emergency room in critical condition and are left in the emergency room for lack of space while waiting to be able to transfer them here.
"
Because the service is saturated, the hospital has 29 intensive care beds for 34 patients currently.
A fragile situation which should worsen as doctors expect an increase in the number of cases with the onset of winter.
Last week, the country broke the sad record of 1,500 new cases per day.
► To read also: Lebanon, a country on its knees
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Coronavirus
Lebanon
Health and medicine
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