1/5 In , despite the good news on the Covid front, the healthcare system finds itself close to falling apart. The pandemic increased the demand on hospitals at a time when a financial crisis resulted in increasingly impoverished patients and mounting costs of imported supplies.

2/5 This has been compounded by the loss of medical and nursing staff who are leaving the country. What can be done? Hospitals may attempt to cut costs, like spending less on infrastructure. As the two recent catastrophic events in Jordan and Iraq showed, that can be hazardous.

3/5 Another solution may be to increase revenue by demanding higher payments from patients or guarantors. That will be difficult, considering the worsening economic crisis. Official financial assistance will also be difficult, considering the current status of our coffers.

4/5 Hospitals currently are increasingly depending on international aid, and donations from our diaspora. Yet, international aid can not be relied upon for the long term. Donors have notoriously a short attention span, especially as other world crisis emerge.

5/5 For the time being, the healthcare sector is holding, but just. A new challenge, such as a new Covid surge, or removing subsidies on imported medical supplies, can precipitate a collapse. The syndicate of hospitals have repeatedly sounded the alarm, anybody out there?