Lebanon to re-impose lockdown as country reaches COVID-19 "red line"

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Lebanon's government will re-impose a lockdown starting Saturday in efforts to curb further spread of COVID-19.

The two-week lockdown comes following a spike in new daily COVID-19 cases, with caretaker Prime Minister Hassan Diab saying a "stage of extreme danger" had been reached.

The government imposed a lockdown between March and June to stem the initial spread of the virus.

The country's caseload ballooned faster after the deadly explosion in the port of Beirut in August.

So far, the ministry of health has reported 95,355 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 732 deaths in total.

However, the BBC reports that in the past month alone, 42,000 people have been infected and 277 patients lost their lives to the virus.

Diab on Tuesday said the country had reached the outbreak "red line."

"Today, we have reached the red line in the number of infections, and we have reached the stage of extreme danger in light of the inability of government and private hospitals to receive critical cases," BBC quotes Diab.

"We are afraid that we will reach a stage where people die in the streets in the absence of places in hospitals to treat the injured, or that there is a trade-off between one person and another."