– The cost of treating a psychiatric patient ranges between 90 and 150 million pounds, and not just for one time
Drugs in Lebanon are cheaper than nerve drugs and easier to obtain
– Suicide cases are on the rise, and the financial collapse has closed mental health departments in several hospitals
The “Asfouriya” that the late Sabah Asfouriya sang to was love, fun and laughter. What the Lebanese are experiencing today is al-Asfouriya in the pathological sense of the word.
Al-Asfouriya is popularly derived from a psychiatric clinic that was known in Lebanon in the past. Today, however, the people of the “Cedar Land” have become prey to physical and psychological illnesses, at a time when the countries of the civilized world are launching awareness campaigns for mental health.
In Lebanon, which years ago raised the slogan of its transformation into the “Oriental Hospital” and witnessed a hospital renaissance at all levels, the status of specialized clinics was strengthened, as wards were established in private hospitals concerned with the mental health of patients, and several awareness campaigns were launched before hospitals collapsed with the lira.
Social institutions have also emerged that deal with the affairs of drug addicts, treat them, and secure ways to care for them through specialized programs to get them out of the cycle of drugs.
But the last three years have turned the health sector upside down. At a time when European and Arab countries were announcing awareness campaigns coinciding with the spread of the “Corona” epidemic to ensure the safety of those forcibly detained in their homes and to address the effects of the isolation they were going through, the Lebanese were living through double tragedies: the collapse of their financial and psychological conditions, the collapse of the hospital sector and the conversion of what was left of it into dollars. , and the interruption of essential medicines, especially nerve drugs, which have become widely circulated.
And what began to appear in a more severe form, coinciding with the spread of suicide cases in an upward manner for some time as a result of social, financial and psychological pressure factors, is the spread of drugs in an open form and many times what it was a few years ago, especially Lebanese hashish, and narcotic pills of all kinds. This is where the problems begin to overlap.
Not all psychiatric patients need to be admitted to specialized hospitals. However, there are cases that require specialized treatment in the hospital and under the supervision of a specialist.
The current dilemma following the collapse of the hospital sector is that there are families who are no longer able to secure treatment for their patients in the hospital following its cost has become very high in dollars.
While the cost of treating any patient started at three million pounds and was then equivalent to two thousand dollars, it has become equivalent to between 90 and 150 million pounds. One family is still waiting for the money to be secured in order to treat one of its patients in a specialized hospital. Note that this treatment is done on a regular basis and not just a surgery, which means that the patient needs to be admitted to the hospital on a permanent basis.
Currently, the family has no choice but to secure alternative medicines to clinical medical treatment, and the cost of these medicines has become very expensive because the price of one package exceeds $200, and medicines are no longer available in Lebanon for special cases, but are now being requested from Turkey or Egypt.
The second problem is that hospitals closed their medicine and psychiatric wards due to economic hardship, which raised the pressure on hospitals that are still able to secure the patients’ needs and faced increasing demand, which also prompts them to raise the amounts of treatments, especially since insurance companies do not cover such costs. These treatments, and that official guarantor agencies and institutions are no longer able to secure what hospitals require in terms of raising the fees for doctors specializing in this field.
The third problem is that due to the deterioration of the financial and economic lives of the majority of the Lebanese, many of them resort to taking tranquilizers. The story usually begins with a visit to specialist and sometimes non-specialist physicians, who prescribe sedatives of two types: a long-term treatment, and a quick-acting sedative for worsening nervous conditions, for sleep, or to calm severe agitation in some patients.
For years, specialized studies have talked regarding high (and sometimes random) demand for these drugs, and the Lebanese have started talking regarding them easily and obtaining them without a prescription.
However, before the collapse of the economic situation, the Ministry of Health and the Syndicate of Physicians and Pharmacists limited the sale of sedative medicines with prescriptions, registered the names of patients, and monitored the number of packages of medicines sold.
However, with the spread of chaos, everything became available, and taking sedatives became common, and they are secured in various ways in Lebanon through pharmacists who circumvent the law and merchants who obtain them from abroad. Note that the price of the package also increased due to the increase in the price of the dollar.
The fourth problem is that the collapse of the drug market, especially sedatives and their high prices, has prompted some patients to turn to buying cheaper drugs in Lebanon, which do not require a visit to a doctor who has become acquainted with US dollars, nor psychological treatment sessions with an expensive bill.
And here begins another and more severe journey of torment, because it becomes a hellish spiral from which the patient and his family alike suffer.
It is clear that the number of drug trafficking networks in Lebanon has increased, and security reports are evidence of that. And since there are types of drugs that start from the lowest price to the most expensive and the highest “quality”, the demand for them, especially locally manufactured pills or hashish, has also become high, especially since obtaining them has become easier than obtaining a box of sedatives through the pharmacy.
And with the onset of addiction to a new type of drug, the journey of suffering begins for families who suddenly find themselves facing an intractable condition to treat their patients from addiction.
In Lebanon, there are effective associations for treating addiction and accompanying the patient on his recovery journey, but treatment is expensive.
These associations that provide free treatments need funding and aid, and they provide the best possible care and try to survive in the midst of financial stumbling and the collapse of social and financial provision.
Note that any special drug addiction treatment in specialized hospitals costs up to $4,000 per month, and medical treatment needs two months, while treatment and social accompaniment need regarding a year to monitor the patient and secure his exit from the state of addiction.
Those who are unable to secure this amount stand helpless in the face of family members turning towards bad choices and falling victim to medical errors and the easy generalization of the culture of sedative drugs, despite all the justifications for the poor economic and financial conditions.
Between psychiatric treatment, securing medicines, suicides, and drug addiction… It is a Lebanese spiral par excellence at a time of financial and social collapse, and families suffocating under the weight of living under disease, poverty, and the loss of the basic necessities of life.
