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Lebanon Faces Medicine Shortages, Stocks Won’t Last More than a Month

A man counts US dollar banknotes next to Lebanese pounds at a currency exchange shop in Beirut, Lebanon April 24, 2020. (Reuters)
A man counts US dollar banknotes next to Lebanese pounds at a currency exchange shop in Beirut, Lebanon April 24, 2020. (Reuters)
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Lebanon Faces Medicine Shortages, Stocks Won’t Last More than a Month

A man counts US dollar banknotes next to Lebanese pounds at a currency exchange shop in Beirut, Lebanon April 24, 2020. (Reuters)
A man counts US dollar banknotes next to Lebanese pounds at a currency exchange shop in Beirut, Lebanon April 24, 2020. (Reuters)

Since March, the Lebanese have been suffering from the shortage of a number of medicines, especially those for chronic diseases, for intermittent periods that used to reach 15 days.

Today, obtaining some medications requires a tour of a number of pharmacies and promises to secure them after periods that may exceed a month.

“This is due to some citizens resorting to stockpiling medicine for fear of interruption or increase of prices in the event that Lebanon’s Central Bank stops subsidizing this sector,” Mahdi, the manager of a pharmacy in Beirut, told Asharq Al-Awsat.

The Central Bank, which provides credit lines to importers of wheat, fuel and medicine, at the official dollar rate, which is still fixed at LBP 1,515, announced that at the end of 2020, it would no longer be able to continue to subsidize these materials in light of the shrinking reserves of foreign currencies.

Mahdi asserts that in June and July, many customers “have sought to buy stocks for a whole year.”

Some pharmacies “used to provide the patient with the quantities he requested, but the distributing companies recently determined the quantities that they give to each pharmacy based on its usual monthly need,” he noted.

The head of the Pharmacists Syndicate, Ghassan Al-Amin, told Asharq Al-Awsat that the panic caused by the Central Bank’s announcement of its inability to continue subsidizing fuel, wheat and medicine after the end of 2020 prompted the Lebanese to stockpile medications, especially since they know that lifting the subsidy means that the drug price will be linked to the dollar valuation in the black market.

The prices will increase by five, based on the current dollar exchange rate in the black market, according to Al-Amin.

He noted that the problem further worsened “with the slow import movement due to the Central Bank’s mechanism to open credit lines for importers based on the official exchange rate.”

Al-Amin stressed that the stock of medicine in warehouses, which used to last for six months, is now insufficient for more than one and a half months, warning of a real disaster that will affect the citizens after the subsidy is lifted.

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Iraq Tries to Stem Influx of Illegal Foreign Workers

Foreign workers in Iraq attend prayers at Baghdad's Abdul Qader al-Jilani mosque. The country, better known for its own exodus of refugees, is home to hundreds of thousands. - AFP
Foreign workers in Iraq attend prayers at Baghdad's Abdul Qader al-Jilani mosque. The country, better known for its own exodus of refugees, is home to hundreds of thousands. - AFP
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Iraq Tries to Stem Influx of Illegal Foreign Workers

Foreign workers in Iraq attend prayers at Baghdad's Abdul Qader al-Jilani mosque. The country, better known for its own exodus of refugees, is home to hundreds of thousands. - AFP
Foreign workers in Iraq attend prayers at Baghdad's Abdul Qader al-Jilani mosque. The country, better known for its own exodus of refugees, is home to hundreds of thousands. - AFP

Rami, a Syrian worker in Iraq, spends his 16-hour shifts at a restaurant fearing arrest as authorities crack down on undocumented migrants in the country better known for its own exodus.

He is one of hundreds of thousands of foreigners working without permits in Iraq, which after emerging from decades of conflict has become an unexpected destination for many seeking opportunities.

"I've been able to avoid the security forces and checkpoints," said the 27-year-old, who has lived in Iraq for seven years and asked that AFP use a pseudonym to protect his identity.

"My greatest fear is to be expelled back to Syria where I'd have to do military service," he said.

The labor ministry says the influx is mainly from Syria, Pakistan and Bangladesh, also citing 40,000 registered immigrant workers.

Now the authorities are trying to regulate the number of foreign workers, as the country seeks to diversify from the currently dominant hydrocarbons sector.

Many like Rami work in the service industry in Iraq.

One Baghdad restaurant owner admitted to AFP that he has to play cat and mouse with the authorities during inspections, asking some employees to make themselves scarce.

Not all those who work for him are registered, he said, because of the costly fees involved.

- Threat of legal action -

Some of the undocumented workers in Iraq first came as pilgrims. In July, Labor Minister Ahmed al-Assadi said his services were investigating information that "50,000 Pakistani visitors" stayed on "to work illegally".

Despite threats of expulsion because of the scale of issue, the authorities at the end of November launched a scheme for "Syrian, Bangladeshi and Pakistani workers" to regularize their employment by applying online before December 25.

The ministry says it will take legal action against anyone who brings in or employs undocumented foreign workers.

Rami has decided to play safe, even though "I really want" to acquire legal employment status.

"But I'm afraid," he said. "I'm waiting to see what my friends do, and then I'll do the same."

Current Iraqi law caps the number of foreign workers a company can employ at 50 percent, but the authorities now want to lower this to 30 percent.

"Today we allow in only qualified workers for jobs requiring skills" that are not currently available, labor ministry spokesman Nijm al-Aqabi told AFP.

It's a sensitive issue -- for the past two decades, even the powerful oil sector has been dominated by a foreign workforce. But now the authorities are seeking to favor Iraqis.

"There are large companies contracted to the government" which have been asked to limit "foreign worker numbers to 30 percent", said Aqabi.

"This is in the interests of the domestic labor market," he said, as 1.6 million Iraqis are unemployed.

He recognized that each household has the right to employ a foreign domestic worker, claiming this was work Iraqis did not want to do.

- 'Life is hard here' -

One agency launched in 2021 that brings in domestic workers from Niger, Ghana and Ethiopia confirms the high demand.

"Before we used to bring in 40 women, but now it's around 100" a year, said an employee at the agency, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity.

It was a trend picked up from rich countries in the Gulf, the employee said.

"The situation in Iraq is getting better, and with salaries now higher, Iraqi home owners are looking for comfort."

A domestic worker earns about $230 a month, but the authorities have quintupled the registration fee, with a work permit now costing more than $800.