Refugees and Migrants Excluded from Vaccine Plan in Lebanon

Controversy over vaccine distribution in Lebanon leaves migrants and refugees without reliable information.

Since February, Lebanon’s marginalized communities have reportedly been left out of the nation’s vaccine rollout plans due in part to the spread of misinformation and political interference. Nadia Hardman, a refugee and migrant rights researcher at Human Rights Watch, states that the government must “invest in targeted outreach to build trust with long-marginalized communities or the Covid-19 vaccination effort is doomed to fail.”

Lebanon’s Health Ministry aims to vaccinate 80% of its population by the end of 2021, but currently the government plans to only  purchase enough doses for about half of the population. As of 5 April, only 233,934 inoculations have been administered among the total 6.8 million. Only 2.86% of this total is made up of people who are non-Lebanese.

One in three inhabitants of Lebanon is a refugee or migrant; this leaves one third of the population left behind and vulnerable to the novel Coronavirus. In comparison to the national average, Palestinian refugees are three times more likely to die with Covid-19 and Syrian refugees are four times more likely. 

The mismanagement of this crisis has caused greater decline in public confidence in government institutions. Scandals involving politicians jumping the line in parliament and securing vaccines from private suppliers for their constituents added to the distrust. 

Syrian refugees, many without legal residency in Lebanon, experience fears of detention, arrest, and deportation if they register for a vaccine through the platform managed by the government; Palestinian refugees express a variation of distrust after being repeatedly blocked from government services in the past. Many hesitate to register also for fear that an exorbitant fee would face them if they did so. 

Lebanon’s economic crisis has left 89% of Syrian refugees in extreme poverty; cramped living conditions and the necessity to go to work amidst quarantine leave them more exposed. More co-morbidities and poorer baseline health conditions additionally exist within many migrant communities living under the poverty line. 

The prevalence of misinformation contributes further to widespread hesitancy to register for inoculation. According to the  International Rescue Committee and the Lebanon Protection Consortium, very few refugees living in Lebanon have access to reliable information about the vaccine. In an interview with Human Rights Watch, one Palestinian woman living in a refugee camp in Rashidieh said, “Nobody has come to explain anything to us. It is not like the beginning of the pandemic when people came to explain [about Covid-19] to us... There is no awareness-raising – instead rumors are spreading on WhatsApp. Nothing has been explained properly... It is essential that the positive side of the vaccine is explained.” 

Hardman emphasized that access to information is crucial to equitable vaccine distribution. Holding regular health briefings and sharing public service announcements are necessary procedures for restoration of public confidence and halting the spread of misinformation.