Lockdown has to end, right now - an opinionated analysis

Opinion Analysis by Tala Majzoub, Staff Writer

May 27th, 2020

When the gradual precautions and the eventual complete lockdown were first announced in March, I praised the Lebanese government for its diligent and thorough efforts in fighting Coronavirus. Today however, the chosen narrative – that lockdown has saved countless lives – has been doggedly upheld by most people, no doubt allowed. Just stay at home or you’re automatically labeled as selfish, inconsiderate or downright ignorant. It has now become a matter of faith that lockdown is vital. Not only is it believed to be causally responsible for 'flattening the curve', but it is feared that releasing it too soon may cause a brand new spike in Coronavirus cases, thus aggravating the already stagnating 'economic disaster'. On what basis has this been made? 

Artwork by: Smishdesigns, political illustrator. 

Over the last couple weeks, we have observed a pattern in the way the Coronavirus has been handled in Lebanon. First, the government introduces strict regulations. Then, once the cases begin to drop, the government begins to ease the lift of the closures. As the restrictions begin to ease, public and private spaces become swarmed with eager crowds (lineup seen at Zara for example[1]), which results in yet another rise in the number of cases, arguably. As a result, the government criticizes the public for not cooperating with their very noble efforts to combat the virus, and impose yet another lockdown. And repeat.

Prime Minister Hassan Diab called on the Lebanese people “not to take the coronavirus issue lightly and to take preventive measures against it.” Diab also warned that “unprecedented measures” could be implemented if the “state of chaos” persisted, and if citizens did not adhere to social distancing measures. Most recently, Lebanon’s Higher Defense Council recommended a two-week extension of the country’s lockdown on Tuesday May 26th, amid a continued escalation of coronavirus disease infections in the country, which, if approved by the Cabinet on Thursday, would see the lockdown set to end on June 7.  

Will we ever break the economically, socially, and psychologically unsustainable pattern? 

One possibility, historians say, is that the coronavirus pandemic could end socially before it ends medically.[2] In other words, people may grow so wary of the restrictions that they declare the pandemic over and learn how to live with the disease, even as it continues to manifest itself in the population and even before an effective treatment is found.

This is already happening in some states, where governors have lifted restrictions, allowing hair salons, nail salons and gyms to reopen, in defiance of warnings by public health officials that such steps are premature.[3] As the economic catastrophe wreaked by the lockdowns grows, more and more people may be ready to say “enough.” I am one of those people. A COVID-19 vaccine is at least a year away, but the current treatment for the disease — the lockdown — must end immediately. Here are some reasons why I believe that it is wrong to continue with the lockdown in Lebanon, and why we should begin to reverse it sooner rather than later. 

Extending the lockdown stunts Lebanon’s already failing economy

Perhaps the most blatantly potent reason as to why the lockdown must be reversed immediately – to continue to put the entire Lebanese economy on hold until there is a vaccine will cause a financial collapse worse than the one impeding us today, if that’s even possible. We all know that the economic situation has long been deteriorating, but how has the Coronavirus crisis impacted is the cash-strapped Lebanon? In other words, كيف زادت الطين عل بلّي؟

According to estimates cited by The Los Angeles Times, the shutdown is costing Lebanon $2.5 billion every month.[4] On April 15, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said that Lebanon’s real gross domestic product (GDP) had contracted by 6.5% in 2019 and inflation would hit 17% for 2020 versus 2.9% the year before. The IMF also expects Lebanon’s GDP to shrink 12% this year.[5] Hani Bohsali, president of the Syndicate of Importers of Foodstuffs, Consumer Products and Drinks, warned that Lebanon’s food reserve has plummeted to dangerous levels due to the difficulties facing the food import sector as a result of the lack of liquidity in dollars and the high exchange rate, sending commodities prices skyrocketing.

Similarly, Tony Ramy, president of the Syndicate of Owners of Restaurants, Cafes, Night Clubs and Pastries in Lebanon, explains that the “tourism sector revenues stand at about $10 billion a year.” He estimated losses in the sector to be $500 million monthly since Lebanon registered its first case in February. He added that the “fast-food services constitute only 5% of the operations of the food and beverage businesses,” disclosing that “785 fast-food businesses have shut down during the period from Sept. 1, 2019, through Feb. 1, 2020, with 25,000 workers having lost their jobs. The coronavirus pandemic has compounded the country’s economic situation with the temporary lockdown.”[6] 

To go beyond abstraction, the famed Le Bristol hotel, which withstood the Lebanese civil war (1975-1990), was forced to permanently shut its doors. Manager Joseph Coubat told Agence France-Presse “now with the coronavirus, and with the financial problems we are going through in the country, the level of occupancy has fallen very low,” saying it was less than 10%.[7]

While the country’s service sector is more lucrative than the productive, agricultural, and industrial sectors, different sectors have also been catastrophically scarred by the pandemic. People who rely on daily wages, including taxi drivers and bus drivers, have been severely affected because of the lockdown and the stay at home policy. On March 24, a desperate taxi driver in Beirut torched his vehicle when the police fined him for not committing to “one passenger per taxi” policy.[8] At the end of March, a photo of an unemployed construction worker went viral as he held up a sign offering his kidney for $50,000 because he is no longer able to pay rent nor provide for his family.[9] The Human Rights Watch reported on April 8th that an inadequate response by the Lebanese government creates the risk of many people going hungry.[10] The facts dictate that the best course of action would be to reopen the economy.

There is no concrete evidence that the lockdown is working

There is no guarantee or even probability that this lockdown will have made any impact on the overall numbers of deaths in say five years’ time. Lives 'saved' now may well be claimed later. Our own immune systems have been honed by hundreds of millions of years of evolution to cope with viral threats. They are the only way we survive in a world full of viral pathogens, many of which we have all already had without ever knowing. But let’s talk numbers now, shall we? 

The very first Coronavirus case was detected on February 27th. Ever since then, the number of cases fluctuated to reach a maximum of 53 cases on March 22nd. Afterwards, the numbers began to exponentially decrease possibly due to the strict measures enforced, to reach a minimum of 1 case on May 5. But after May 5, we witnessed a massive spike in number of cases, eventually leading up to 63 cases recorded on May 21st.[11]Are we going to keep going back and forth? Are our meticulous efforts worthless in the face of Coronavirus? How many times till we internalize that this is not the most efficient method?  

You are most definitely forgiven for thinking that the lockdown is the only way to go. But the fact is that direct evidence for the effectiveness of lockdown in this situation is minimal, and the approach is mainly based on modelling. Many counties with very different approaches to lockdown seem to have similar curves. It’s easy to make plausible-sounding arguments that what we are doing 'must' be slowing the spread. But Sweden’s model of voluntary social distancing seems equally effective, but with much lower costs.

As of today (May 22nd) the number of recorded deaths is 26 out of 1,086 Coronavirus cases, which means 2.5% of the infected are likely to pass away.[12] But no further information about the deaths has been disclosed, which means we don’t really know which age group is most vulnerable in Lebanon. The reality remains, that the vast majority of people under 65, and virtually everyone under 50, will be no more inconvenienced by COVID-19 than by a cold. That’s why they must be allowed to work, socialize, volunteer and attend school. Do the healthy old, as well as 'vulnerable' groups, need the state to extend this damaging experience for their own good or would they like to make their own risk assessments in the face of uncertainty, as they have always done before?

Coronavirus is almost certainly not a constant threat to humanity

An evolutionary view suggests that the virus is likely to alter fast, with less contagious forms becoming prevalent. On an individual level, our bodies build up immunity by producing antibodies that recognize and fight off an infection from invading pathogens such as SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19.

The body can build up these antibodies naturally after you are exposed to and sickened by a virus, or you can receive a vaccine that elicits the same antibody response without the infection. On this view, asymptomatic people spreading the virus is a positive thing because it means that the disease becomes milder more quickly – the complete lockdown might potentially slow this valuable tendency, which could already be contributing to the flattening of the deaths curves that we are seeing. In this case, the sooner we lift lockdown, the better.

The virus will come into equilibrium with the population as wider immunity combines with predominantly milder forms of the virus to cause a lower overall death rate that nevertheless fluctuates from year to year, much like the flu. 

No one thinks this virus will be completely exterminated. It will be persistent within the population and will spread in its own way. Assem Araji, head of Lebanon’s parliamentary health committee, proclaims that over the three months since the outbreak of COVID-19 in Lebanon, doctors and health teams throughout the country had learnt how to deal with the virus and had shared their experiences. “But if the virus mutates, our capabilities decline, and we go for the herd immunity.”[13] 

The impact of this pathogen will be measured, like the flu, over the years. Some years will be worse than others. Unfortunately, one of the big open questions right now is whether recovered coronavirus patients are immune from contracting the disease a second time. The World Health Organization has emphasized that we do not know if people who recover from COVID-19 are capable of getting sick again with the virus. Jared Baeten, a professor of medicine and global health at the University of Washington says “We don’t know yet if having the virus protects you from getting it again”. “Individual immunity is not yet proven, much less herd immunity.” Baeten says.[14] This paves the way us to my final point.

The Lebanese can and should be trusted to behave sensibly 

Or at least the majority of the population, for that matter. But the problem is, people are bound to storm supermarket and shopping stores when the governments warns of a “complete and absolute lockdown”. It’s our survival instinct which drives us to rush to the stores, to make the most out of our freedom window while we still can. This is what results in the massive crowds we’re seeing, and I don’t blame the people one bit for going to the stores.

I do however, blame the people who are not taking the necessary precautions. Social distancing measures exist for a reason, and that's to slow the spread of viral transmission from people who come into close contact. Face masks are also principal in our fight against the spread of the pandemic, and I do wish the Lebanese government realized that for many, face masks are a luxury they cannot afford. This is why the responsibility falls on each and every one of us, privileged enough to be able to even access this article on their phones or laptops.

As The Phoenix Daily Editor-in-Chief Sarah El-Abd puts it, “to adapt means to merge, to merge between our current situation and the future, NOT our current situation and how things were in the past.”

It is our duty to spread awareness, our duty to help supply the less fortunate with sanitation stations with hand sanitizers, masks, and gloves. Similarly, it remains the government’s job to devise a safe and gradual exit strategy based on known data about the disease and the demographics that are most vulnerable to it (oh and, to make sure expats arriving to Lebanon do not violate the mandatory confinement). The same way sustaining the lockdown would be a gigantic mistake, unfettered re-openings would be a gigantic mistake. 

Dr. Susan Murray, of the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin reiterates, “if we are not prepared to fight fear and ignorance as actively and as thoughtfully as we fight any other virus, it is possible that fear can do terrible harm to vulnerable people, even in places that never see a single case of infection during an outbreak. And a fear epidemic can have far worse consequences when complicated by issues of race, privilege, and language.”[15] Maybe it’s time to tone it down with the curfews a bit, what do you say? 

[1] Yassine, Hussein, and Lebanon News·. “Long Lineup Was Seen At Zara In Lebanon.” The961, 10 May 2020, www.the961.com/lineup-seen-at-zara-lebanon/.

[2] “When Will the Pandemic End? And How?” The New York Times, The New York Times, 10 May 2020, www.nytimes.com/2020/05/10/us/coronavirus-deaths-cases.html. 

[3] Majzoub, Tala. “In Denmark, a Rare Phenomenon: Fresh Haircuts Has Denmark Seen the Back of the Coronavirus Outbreak?” The Phoenix Daily, The Phoenix Daily, 27 Apr. 2020, www.thephoenixdaily.net/internationalaffairs/in-denmark-a-rare-phenomenon-fresh-haircuts-has-denmark-seen-the-back-of-the-coronavirus-outbreak.

[4] “Lonely Joggers and Fretful Bakers: The Coronavirus Is Hitting the Middle East Hard.” Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 17 Mar. 2020, www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2020-03-17/coronavirus-middle-east-governments.

[5] “IMF Sees Crisis-Hit Lebanon's Output Shrinking 12% in 2020.” Reuters, Thomson Reuters, 15 Apr. 2020, www.reuters.com/article/lebanon-crisis-imf/imf-sees-crisis-hit-lebanons-output-shrinking-12-in-2020-idUSL5N2C361P.

[6] “Since 1946, We Bring Together Entrepreneurs and Owners of the Most Reputable F&B Establishments.: Syndicate of Owners of Restaurants, Cafes, Night-Clubs & Pastries in Lebanon.” Since 1946, We Bring Together Entrepreneurs and Owners of the Most Reputable F&B Establishments. | Syndicate of Owners of Restaurants, Cafes, Night-Clubs & Pastries in Lebanon, www.syndicatercnp.com/.

[7] France-Presse, Agence. “Landmark Lebanon Hotel Closes over Economic Crisis.” Rappler, www.rappler.com/business/258375-lebanon-le-bristol-hotel-closes-over-economic-crisis-coronavirus.

[8] مجتمع المدن -. “سليم خدوج سائق التاكسي الذي أحرق سيارته.. ماذا يقول؟.” Almodon, المدن, www.almodon.com/society/2020/3/24/سليم-خدوج-سائق-التاكسي-الذي-أحرق-سيارته-ماذا-يقول.

[9] Za, Bassam. “Lebanese Man Offers to Sell Kidney to Support Family.” Mena – Gulf News, Gulf News, 24 Mar. 2019, gulfnews.com/world/mena/lebanese-man-offers-to-sell-kidney-to-support-family-1.62839015.

[10] “Lebanon: Direct COVID-19 Assistance to Hardest Hit.” Human Rights Watch, 8 Apr. 2020, www.hrw.org/news/2020/04/08/lebanon-direct-covid-19-assistance-hardest-hit.

[11] “Lebanon.” Worldometer, www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/lebanon/.

[12] Ibid.

[13] Person. “Lebanese Rush to Shops, Banks, and Cafes as 4-Day Virus Lockdown Lifted.” Arab News, Arabnews, 19 May 2020, www.arabnews.com/node/1676656/middle-east.

[14] Mock, Jillian. “Is Herd Immunity Our Best Weapon Against COVID-19?” Discover Magazine, Discover Magazine, 4 May 2020, www.discovermagazine.com/health/is-herd-immunity-our-best-weapon-against-covid-19.

[15] Kolata, Gina. “How Pandemics End.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 10 May 2020, www.nytimes.com/2020/05/10/health/coronavirus-plague-pandemic-history.html.