Emily Lewis

Work

A selection of some of my work published online and in print for Lebanese and international news outlets 

Euronews.com •

What’s behind the surprising growth of one Antarctic ice sheet?

We often hear about polar ice melting due to global warming, but one Antarctic ice shelf has grown in the last 20 years, new research has found. Scientists say that changing wind and sea ice patterns have led the eastern Antarctic Peninsula Ice Sheet to expand since the start of the 21st century. This followed two decades of ice retreat. A team of researchers from the universities of Cambridge and Newcastle in the UK and Canterbury University in New Zealand found that floating ice shelves on t
L'Orient-Le Jour •

Le système libanais de protection sociale laisse les personnes âgées à la merci de la crise économique

Selon la Déclaration universelle des droits de l’homme, tout membre d’une société a droit à une protection sociale. Au Liban pourtant, ce droit n’est pas garanti. Lorsque les personnes atteignent un âge avancé, elles sont laissées sans protection sociale en raison des défaillances du système de sécurité sociale et de celui des pensions de retraite. Aujourd’hui, avec l’aggravation de la crise économique et alors que le coût de la vie au Liban atteint des sommets vertigineux, les personnes âgées s
L'Orient Today •

No longer just a battle against illness: Cancer treatment is now a fight that takes on an economic crisis

As a physician treating Lebanon’s youngest cancer patients, Peter Noun always tries to remain positive. The tagline on the website of Kids First, the association he co-founded in 2005 to support children with cancer, is one of hope — “We Cancervive.” Now, however, with Lebanon’s health care system crumbling, seeing the best in things is not so easy. Stocks of medicines and equipment are running dry, highly skilled doctors and nurses are fleeing the country at record rates and health i
L'Orient Today •

Price increases leave 77 percent of people who menstruate unable to afford period products: Study

BEIRUT — Seventy-seven percent of women and girls surveyed by Lebanese feminist collective Fe-Male are having difficulty accessing menstrual products due to a steep rise in prices, a study released today by Fe-Male and NGO Plan International says. The study is the latest in a series of reports marking growing levels of period poverty over the last year, as inflation soars and people who menstruate struggle to afford the pads, tampons and panty liners they need to manage their periods safely. “
L'Orient Today •

Internet connectivity: The latest in a line of services falling victim to Lebanon’s electricity shortages

BEIRUT — On Friday morning, state telecommunications company Ogero announced that telephone and internet services in the Chouf area of Barouk were cut off. The same thing had happened down the road in Beiteddine on Tuesday. The reason? The generators that provide back-up power to Ogero’s central offices during interruptions in the state electricity supply were overloaded and had to be switched off. Similar outages have happened at the towers that transmit cell phone signals. With Électricité
L'Orient Today •

‘The temporary has become permanent’: The evolution of Lebanon’s densely populated and poorly serviced Palestinian refugee camps

BEIRUT — Squeezed between the tightly packed buildings of the Mar Elias Palestinian refugee camp on May 20, dozens of people draped in their nation’s flag and traditional black-and-white kuffiyeh scarves prepare to march. As they emerge from the narrow, brightly painted walkways of Lebanon’s smallest official camp and set off across Beirut, they chant messages of solidarity with Palestinians in Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood and Gaza facing Israeli aggression.
L'Orient Today •

Long COVID is afflicting Lebanese patients months after their initial infection, but treatment is hard to come by

BEIRUT — When 45-year-old Caline Mouawad contracted COVID-19 in January, she hardly noticed — everything felt more or less normal, apart from a slight fever. Four months later, she is so exhausted, she can hardly get through the day. “I simply cannot pull myself out of bed,” she told L’Orient Today. “I get up at 12 p.m. to make lunch for my kids and then go back to sleep. “I have had to stop everything,” including her work as a lawyer, she said. After visiting multiple doctors over the past f
L'Orient Today •

Anti-corruption crusader or political lackey? The controversial judge at the heart of Lebanon’s latest judicial saga

BEIRUT — Amid the raft of mid-level appointees who make up the Lebanese judiciary, Judge Ghada Aoun has established herself as a widely recognizable public figure. The Mount Lebanon public prosecutor surged into the public consciousness yet again recently after raiding — on at least three separate occasions — the offices of the Mecattaf Holding Group, defying an order from Lebanon’s top prosecutor, Ghassan Oueidat, that removed her from financial crimes cases. The wholesale money exchange group
L'Orient Today •

COVID-19 vaccine centers link appointment no-shows to health concerns over the jabs’ rare side effects

BEIRUT — Each day, hundreds of people fail to show up to their appointment to receive a COVID-19 vaccine. Last week, 26,699 doses of the vaccine were administered, but 3,447 people missed their slot, according to the Central Inspection Bureau, the government’s auditing body. While missed appointments are to be expected in any inoculation drive, reports from hospitals over the last week indicate that mounting concerns over the side effects of the AstraZeneca vaccine are causing people to activel
L'Orient Today •

Long queues form at gas stations as importers face delays in securing fuel

BEIRUT — A familiar scene has re-emerged at Lebanon’s gas stations over the past few days. Cars and mopeds are backed up at the pumps, spilling over onto the streets as they wait to fill their tanks. Some stations have cordoned off their pumps altogether, forcing motorists to visit multiple stations to refuel. The blame, fuel suppliers say, falls squarely on Banque du Liban. Sources told L’Orient Today that the central bank is delaying payments to foreign suppliers, which is causing backlogs
L'Orient Today •

The Future Movement is building its own vaccination program as Lebanon’s public campaign falls short

BEIRUT — The Future Movement is registering residents across Lebanon for COVID-19 vaccines that the party’s president, Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri, is trying to secure from abroad, Future MPs told L’Orient Today. The initiative appears to be the most widespread campaign by a political party to distribute vaccines, with MPs and party officials reaching out to municipalities, religious organizations and party offices across the country to sign people up for inoculations. Alongside the F
L'Orient Today •

Pharmacies close their doors as the lira’s rapid slide and drug shortages pile on pressure

BEIRUT — Pharmacists across Lebanon pulled down their shutters Thursday as part of a nationwide strike to protest the economic conditions that have left them unable to provide for patients’ needs. A group of pharmacists staged a demonstration in front of the Health Ministry in Bir Hasan with two principal demands: an increase to their profit margins and a solution to ongoing medicine shortages. They warned that if their demands aren’t met, they may have to close their pharmacies permanently.
L'Orient Today •

The prolonged suspension of in-person schooling lays bare inequalities in access to education

BEIRUT — Schools are slated to gradually begin reopening their doors this coming Monday, but with caretaker Education Minister Tarek Majzoub’s conditions for a return to classroom learning still unmet, it appears the uncertainty and disruption that have defined the last two years of education in Lebanon will persist. Save The Children estimates that more than 1 million children across Lebanon have missed out on proper schooling for more than a year due to school closures and the deepening econo
L'Orient Today •

MPs vote in committee to give a stopgap $200 million to import fuel for electricity

BEIRUT — MPs voted Tuesday in favor of a $200 million transfer to keep Lebanon’s power plants running for the next couple of months, while taking another chunk out of the central bank’s rapidly dwindling foreign reserves. The vote came during a joint session of the Finance and Budget Committee, Public Works, Transport, Energy and Water Committee and Administration and Justice Committee. The law will now move forward to be voted upon by the full Parliament.
L'Orient Today •

As prices for sanitary products soar, some women and girls are turning to riskier options to manage their periods

BEIRUT — In the midst of Lebanon’s economic collapse and faced with soaring inflation, women and girls are being forced to change the way they manage their periods, a new UN study has found. “Many families are having to adopt new coping strategies,” said Chaza Akik, a public health research professor at the American University of Beirut, who presented the study commissioned by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) at a virtual conference Friday. Seventy-seven women and girls from vulner
L'Orient Today •

‘Bad options’ and ‘no easy solutions’: The lira’s path to crisis and the challenges of solving Lebanon’s currency woes

BEIRUT — Over the weekend, the value of the Lebanese lira descended to record lows of LL10,800 to the dollar, breaking a historic and psychological milestone in the currency’s collapse. In response, the government introduced a crackdown on exchange shops and online platforms that display the market dollar price, a move that many economists and financial commentators say will not work and will only drive the parallel market further underground. Transforming Lebanon’s currency and creating a s
L'Orient Today •

Officials promised equal access, but refugees are already receiving COVID-19 vaccines at a much slower rate than Lebanese

BEIRUT — At the launch of the national campaign for COVID-19 vaccinations earlier this month, health officials insisted that all residents of Lebanon would have equal access to inoculations, regardless of nationality. The World Bank’s regional director, Saroj Kumar Jha, has said on multiple occasions that the $34 million in financing reallocated to fund COVID-19 vaccines is tied to equitable access to vaccines, as “no one is safe until everyone is safe.” However, just 10 days into the vaccinat
L'Orient Today •

Domestic workers who leave their jobs can no longer be accused of a crime. Here's why that's important

BEIRUT — Last week, Lebanese General Security issued a decision to no longer allow employers to file criminal complaints against migrant domestic workers for “running away” from their workplace. It was hailed as a new victory in the fight against the kafala, or sponsorship, system that controls the relationship between employers and domestic workers. However, advocates say there is still a long way to go towards dismantling what many see as an oppressive system that deprives these workers — mos
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