Lebanese Initiatives to Marshal Resources in COVID-19 Fight

Arab World

April 4th, 8:34am

Beirut - Caroline Akoum

Lebanese nurses at a ward where the first case of coronavirus in the country was being treated, at the Rafik Hariri University Hospital in the southern outskirts of Beirut, on February 22, 2020. file photo

Several individual initiatives have been launched in Lebanon to battle the coronavirus such as treating patients, providing quarantine centers for suspected cases and offering residential units for nurses and doctors. Former Education Minister and deputy Elias Bou Saab rented the Lebanese Canadian Hospital in Sin el-Fil near Beirut for a year to set it up for treating coronavirus patients from the Metn region, where the highest number of confirmed cases have been registered. Bou Saab said the hospital would be managed by the Ministry of Health to provide free hospitalization for COVID-19 patients, similar to other public hospitals. The Lebanese Canadian Hospital had been closed for seven months. Several hotel owners have rejected to use their institutions as quarantine centers for virus patients who do not need hospital treatment. But Richard Shikhani, who owns a hotel in the eastern Lebanese city of Zahle, said that he placed his guesthouse at the disposal of the Health Ministry. The hotel would be equipped for the town’s residents as part of the anti-coronavirus campaign, he said. The same move was taken by Jamal Baarini, a hotel owner in the northern district of Akkar. Young Lebanese have also launched an initiative called Baytna Baytak to provide apartments for free to doctors on the frontlines of the coronavirus outbreak, to avoid contact with their family members and risk transmitting the disease. “This initiative started when learned about fears that medical field personnel could transmit the virus to their loved ones” if they return home from work, Maroun Karam, a volunteer with Baytna Baytak, told Asharq Al-Awsat on Friday. The first apartment was offered by another volunteer to doctors and nurses. “We first shared our initiative on social media, and were surprised by many Lebanese willing to take part in it, mainly those living abroad and owning houses which they have left vacant,” Karam said. He said that by April 1, there were 162 apartments across Lebanon designated for nurses and doctors. Also, several volunteers across the country are receiving donations to buy food for poor families. The “3a Adna” initiative, for example, is one of such campaigns. It has so far received donations worth LL37 million to buy food for around 665 families across the country.

from Asharq AL-awsat https://aawsat.com/english/home/article/2215996/lebanese-initiatives-marshal-resources-covid-19-fight