Politicians in Lebanon jumped the queue for covid-19 vaccine

AT FIRST GLANCE one might have thought the cardboard box was a visiting head of state. On February 13th Lebanon’s first batch of covid-19 vaccines emerged from a jet at Beirut’s international airport. A delegation of officials drove out to meet it; local media broadcast the event live. Never mind that the shipment contained a meagre 28,500 jabs. After a miserable year of pandemic, economic collapse and a catastrophic explosion in Beirut, the vaccines offered a dose of hope.

Scepticism, a pre-existing condition in a country notorious for corruption, prevailed too. Many Lebanese expected the rich and powerful to jump the queue to get their shots. They drew some comfort from the involvement of the World Bank, which in January allocated $34m to fund vaccine imports, enough to cover doses for more than 2m people (a third of the population).

Lebanon was the first country to strike such an agreement with the bank. It came, however, with conditions. The bank demanded transparency. Lebanon would have to set up a system for distributing vaccines. Everyone would have to wait their turn. “There will be no wasta,” said Ferid Belhaj, the bank’s top official for the Middle East, using an Arabic word that connotes nepotism. The health ministry published a plan that allocated the first doses for medical workers...