Covid-19…Lebanon to Impose Three-Week Lockdown

Hours ago, Lebanon's parliamentary Health Committee recommended a three-week lockdown to curb the unprecedented surge in Covid-19 cases and reduce pressure on the health sector.

The lockdown decision comes amid expectations that the number of coronavirus cases would continue to rise over the next week, as the country witnessed chaos during the holidays, according to what the Parliamentary Health Committee member Bilal Abdullah said.

The expected high numbers resulted from huge gatherings happened during the Christmas period, as well as the New Year's Eve parties, Abdullah explained in an interview with Asharq Al-Awsat, noting that they are expected to see these numbers within a week or 10 days.

The daily Coronavirus counter exceeded 3500 two days ago, recording an unprecedented number, amid expectations that the number will exceed 5,000 next week.

A number of hospitals and laboratories witnessed a massive crowd, as the Lebanese rushed to conduct "PCR" tests following the New Year's Eve celebrations.

Abdullah stated that the first goal of the lockdown is to reduce the spread of the pandemic, as well as the pressure on the health sector, as 20 of every 100 cases check into hospital and 5 of them enter intensive care.

He warned that January and February are going to be critical time in terms of the high number of infections and deaths from the virus.

Ministerial Committee is expected to meet next Monday in order to impose the lockdown from 3 to 4 weeks, with an exception of pharmacies and food places.

On his part, Head of the Health Committee Assem Araji stressed the need to close the country for three weeks, noting that the health sector is on the verge of collapse.

Araji revealed that Lebanon has lost control of the new Coronavirus due to the chaos that prevailed in the past weeks, pointing out that since the beginning of last December until today, about 100 patients have entered intensive care.

The Lebanese “Al-Nashra” agency quoted Araji saying that his country will approach the Italian scenario regarding the new Coronavirus this January, pointing out: “we can reach a daily cases of 4 and 5 thousand.”