Beirut (AFP)

Lebanon's economic collapse and power shortages make hospitals very vulnerable and less equipped to deal with a possible new wave of the Covid-19 epidemic, warns the director of the country's largest public hospital.

In addition to the emigration of healthcare staff and drug shortages, hospitals are facing power cuts sometimes approaching 22 hours a day as well as a scarcity of fuel oil, essential for the operation of private electricity generators which take over when the national company offloads.

"All hospitals (...) are now less prepared than they were at the time of the wave at the beginning of the year", deplores Firass Abiad, director of the Rafic University Hospital to AFP. Hariri, on the front line of the fight against Covid-19.

"Members of the medical and nursing staff have left, drugs that were once available are exhausted" and the lack of power endangers the operation of hospitals and the lives of patients, continues the doctor, who has become a reference for the general public in Lebanon thanks to his management of the crisis within his establishment and the advice he provides on social networks.

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"We only have two to three hours of electricity (per day), the rest of the time it is up to the generators" to power the establishment and "we carry the enormous burden of having to constantly fetch fuel oil" to feed them, he explains.

The country faces fuel shortages and prices have nearly doubled in just over a month as the Lebanese pound continues to plummet.

At Rafic Hariri Hospital, it is not uncommon for certain drugs to run out of stocks.

"Some days, we are forced to ask relatives of patients to pick up medicine in another hospital or in a pharmacy," says Firass Abiad.

As the situation in hospitals continues to deteriorate, cases of coronavirus are climbing again, against the backdrop of a general relaxation and an influx of Lebanese from the diaspora.

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On Thursday, 98 people tested positive after landing at Beirut airport, nearly 20% of the cases officially recorded during the day.

"If this increase (...) leads to a peak like the one we saw at the start of the year, it would be catastrophic," warns Firass Abiad.

The country of more than six million people has recorded more than 550,000 cases, including 7,890 deaths.

© 2021 AFP