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          Lebanon's Trash Crisis Drags On, Worrying Doctors Even More

   by Associated Press

   Lebanon's trash collection crisis, which sent thousands protesting into
   the streets last summer, is now in its eight month with still no
   resolution in sight. Though it has prompted political debates and
   occasional heated discussions, Lebanese doctors and medical
   professionals are increasingly alarmed by its effect on health.
   At the emergency room at the Sacre Coeur hospital outside Beirut,
   doctors say they are seeing a spike in severe respiratory diseases and
   that it's tied to the ongoing trash disaster.
   The collection crisis erupted last July after authorities closed the
   primary landfill for Beirut and the surrounding coastal governorate
   without providing an alternative. Thousands took to the streets and the
   demonstrations were a catharsis of discontent directed at the political
   class, which has walled itself off from popular opinion and failed to
   provide other basic services such as water, electricity and drainage.
   But the protests died down and politicians have been in no hurry to
   solve the disaster. Politicians have instead been occupied with
   containing the fallout of an abrupt Saudi Arabian decision to cancel $4
   billion in aid, most of it marked for the army.

   It's not just Sacre Coeur that is under strain - hospital beds across
   Beirut have been full this winter, partly because of a panic over swine
   flu, which Health Minister Wael Abou Faour said took four lives through
   mid-February, but doctors say more patients are coming in because of
   the garbage.
   "We're seeing new profiles in the emergency rooms this year,'' said
   Joelle Khadra-Eid, an ER doctor at Sacre Coeur. "These are people who
   didn't have asthma or allergies when they were young. They've been
   exposed to ... pollution that wasn't around before.''
   Beirut streets are kept relatively garbage-free - which has helped
   pacify the public - and the trash is being pushed to the city's
   periphery, where it piles up along the roadside and the banks of the
   Beirut River.
   "In some cases, they start burning the trash, and then we see
   widespread breathing difficulties and skin infections,'' said Rachid
   Rahme, the director of Sacre Coeur's emergency and critical care units.
   In the suburb of Jdeideh, to Beirut's east, local officials closed a
   winding road to create a rivulet of garbage, stuffed into large white
   sacks, which snakes down the hill. After a local newspaper, The Daily
   Star, published a photo, residents joked that it must be one of the
   country's much-hyped ski slopes, and the international press flocked to
   the vista.
   But the international exposure hasn't shamed politicians into action
   yet. More than once, government ministers announced an imminent
   solution to crisis, which never materialized, and now there is talk of
   dissolving Prime Minister Tammam Salam's government.
   On Thursday, Salam told his Cabinet that "there is no need for the
   government to stay'' if it can't resolve this crisis, Information
   Minister Ramzi Joreige said.
   A few municipalities launched their own recycling initiatives, but many
   others simply resorted to burning their garbage, often in residential
   areas. Air contamination in these areas became more than 400 times
   worse than pollution in the country's industrial areas, a study by the
   American University of Beirut revealed last year.
   In December, six months into the crisis, Rahme said cases of
   gastroenteritis had already gone up 30 percent, compared to 2014, the
   year before the trash crisis.
   Most recently, Rahme said admissions rates at Sacre Coeur's ER have
   jumped 25 percent, and routine symptoms are growing more severe.
   It's too early for any firm statistics on if and how the spikes in
   illnesses have affected mortality rates, but the trend is alarming,
   doctors say.
   "We're facing a huge outbreak in persistent infections, either in the
   respiratory system, where viral infections can linger on for six weeks
   or more, or in the gastrointestinal tract,'' he said.
   "We are seeing diarrhea, vomiting, and abdominal pain that go on for
   three to four weeks,'' he added.
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   [1]http://www.voanews.com/content/lebanon-trash-crisis-drags-on-worries
   -doctors/3224268.html

References

   1. http://www.voanews.com/content/lebanon-trash-crisis-drags-on-worries-doctors/3224268.html