Caretaker Health Minister Firass Abiad at the presidential palace in Baabda, on Oct. 21, 2022. (Credit: Dalati and Nohra)
Caretaker Health Minister Firass Abiad called on the Finance Ministry Wednesday to grant public health workers their "promised cash assistance," as Lebanon struggles with a cholera outbreak and a collapsed health sector.
"Public health workers attend their jobs every day, unlike other public workers who only have to attend work once a week," Abiad said during a press conference. He also said the Health Ministry is offering free lab tests, to detect cholera in water, to all municipalities and that the same should be done at public hospitals.
Abiad said he has asked the Information Ministry to launch an awareness campaign to encourage people to follow the instructions of the Health Ministry and take the cholera vaccine.
"Nearly 10,000 doses of the vaccine will arrive in Lebanon within the next 10 days," the health minister announced Saturday. "[The doses] will be used primarily by medical teams dealing with the spread of cholera and by people in crowded places such as prisons ... Then we can distribute them to schools and other institutions."
Lebanon recorded 18 new cases of cholera between Monday and Tuesday, bringing the case count total to 305, the Ministry of Health announced in its daily report. No new deaths were reported, with the total deaths still standing at 11 since the first case in Lebanon appeared on Oct. 5.
This is Lebanon's first cholera outbreak since 1993.
Last week, Abiad said he was concerned about the "rapid spread of the disease." Most of the cases are located in Syrian refugee communities in Lebanon, but Abiad warned there is "an increase in cases among Lebanese."
He said most of the victims died because they did not receive the necessary medical care.