Coronavirus: Lebanon is gradually deconfining, despite the slight drop in cases

Audio 01:28

Terrace of a restaurant in Beirut, November 30.

The country is gradually deconfining.

REUTERS - MOHAMED AZAKIR

Text by: RFI Follow

5 mins

Lebanon has been gradually deconfining since Monday after two weeks of total closure of restaurants, bars and public places.

The country has already been hit very hard by the economic crisis, the devaluation of its currency and the explosion of August 4, which devastated the capital Beirut, left 200 dead and thousands of victims.

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From our correspondent in Beirut,

Noé Pignède

Traders caught by the throat demanded the reopening of their shops.

The government gave in.

At the Torino counter, in the tourist district of Gemmayzé, Fiona drinks a beer with her friends, happy that the confinement is over.

“ 

You know, I think with coronavrius what hurt me the most was loneliness.

Not seeing your friends, it turns your brain!

So it feels good to be home, and this bar is like my home,

 ”she says.

►Also read

: Reconfinement in Lebanon, a new blow for the economy

Louaï, the owner of the bar, is extremely relieved, because between the economic crisis, the repeated cover-fires and the explosion of August 4, his boxes are empty.

“ 

We opened, closed, opened, closed, opened, closed.

Then everything was ravaged by the explosion, we renovated everything.

Then we had this new confinement.

It's hard, we work almost for free.

Thank goodness the rent and the bills are paid.

We are in a better situation than a lot of people, but we have to earn income if we want to survive.

 "

"

We must continue to work

"

Like all traders in the neighborhood, he criticizes the measures taken by the government.

“ 

They are trying to put policies in place to fight the coronavirus, and I don't know if they are really effective.

Of course, we don't want people to get sick, and we don't want to get sick either.

But we must continue to work.

This bar remained open throughout the 2006 war, it is not the Corona that will make us lower the curtain,

 ”he continues.

After two weeks of confinement, the number of contaminations in Lebanon has so far not decreased.

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  • Lebanon

  • Coronavirus

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