BEIRUT (Dispatches) – Lebanon’s Medical Equipment & Devices Importers Syndicate have warned that stocks of medication for chronic diseases and infant formula will run out within weeks.
This came in a statement issued by Head of the syndicate Karim Jbara during a press conference in the capital, Beirut.
Jbara stated: “The stock of medications, medicines for incurable diseases and baby formula will run out after a few weeks. We will not be able to overcome this critical situation unless imports are allowed.”
On Thursday, the Central Bank of Lebanon issued a statement calling on the government to approve a plan to rationalize subsidies to protect the neediest groups and put an end to exploitation and evasion.
Meanwhile, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, in interfering remarks on Saturday, said that Lebanese leaders could face sanctions unless they pull the country away from financial collapse and strike a deal with the IMF.
Lebanon is facing what the World Bank has described as one of the world’s worst economic crises since the 1850s.
A political crisis has left the country without a functioning government since the last one resigned after a massive explosion killed dozens and destroyed swathes of Beirut in August 2020.
Speaking in Beirut after talks with Lebanese President Michel Aoun, Borrell said he had “a message of firmness to all Lebanese political leaders on behalf of the EU”.
“The crisis Lebanon is facing is a domestic crisis, is a self-imposed crisis, not a crisis coming from abroad or from external factors,” he claimed.