by ima46 | Nov 21, 2025 | Uncategorized
It was a quiet Sunday afternoon in a small town in the West Bekaa. Two friends, Jad (15) and Rami (14), were enjoying a simple innocent motor bike ride. But unfortunately, they were hit by a speeding SUV.
The town folk gathered around the 2 boys that were laying bleeding on the asphalt road. The ambulance arrived quickly. Jad needed immediate, high-level trauma care. He needed a specialized surgeon within minutes. The nearest facility capable of saving his life, however, was in Zahle, a 45-minute drive through challenging rural roads.
For severe trauma, 45 minutes is not a journey, but it is a critical time window that determines fate. While Rami survived after weeks in the ICU, Jad unfortunately bled out on the way.
His death wasn’t solely a result of the collision. But it was a devastating consequence of a systemic, geographical failure.
The Evidence: Mapping the Disparity
This tragedy is not an isolated incident of bad luck. It is the human cost of a deeply imbalanced healthcare system. Our data analysis confirms what rural families already know: Access to care is dangerously centralized.
The visualization of medical facilities across Lebanon’s districts illustrates this shocking disparity:
-
The areas highlighted in Green (the top 3) enjoy a dense concentration of hospitals, offering multiple lifelines within minutes.
-
On the opposite end, the areas highlighted in Red (the bottom 4) show bars that are barely visible, confirming these are healthcare deserts.
The system is designed to serve the city, leaving the vast rural expanse with an inadequate margin of error. Your chance of survival is, quite literally, dictated by the proximity of your nearest bar on this chart.
The Solution
We cannot solve the problem of distance by trying to build a new university medical center in every district. That is fiscally impossible. The real solution is smart, targeted investment in stabilizing the patient, not relocating the hospital.
Our data, which shows the alarmingly low density of First Aid and Care Units in the rural areas, points directly to the answer. We must transform these simple clinics into advanced, highly efficient units.
1. Buying Time
The difference between life and death for someone like Jad is the critical time immediately following a severe injury.
The goal of a new, Trauma-Ready Care Unit is to manage and stabilize major injuries (like severe bleeding or airway obstruction) for 30 minutes. It’s not a full operating room, but it has the specialized staff and equipment to:
By creating these small hubs, we effectively shrink the deadly 45-minute travel time into a manageable window, giving the patient the chance to survive the journey to the major hospital.
2. Decompressing the ER
The benefits flow both ways. Today, emergency rooms in major urban hospitals (like those in Zahle or Baabda) are often jammed with non-critical cases:
By upgrading rural units, these facilities can handle this high volume of urgent but non-life-threatening cases.
The immediate effect is a massive reduction in pressure on the urban ERs. This allows the major city hospitals to focus their specialized surgeons and resources entirely on the true, severe emergencies, like the trauma case that should have saved Jad.
Big Idea: “Healthcare equality is not just about bringing care closer; it’s about making sure the right care is available at the right time for everyone, everywhere.” Investing in these small, advanced units is the fastest, most cost-effective way to bridge the deadly gap on our map.
by cse13 | Nov 21, 2025 | Dashboard, Visualization
Samer is a 58-year-old shop owner in Baabda.
He has diabetes and hypertension, and like many others living with chronic conditions, he spent the early months of the pandemic in quiet fear. He followed every guideline, avoided unnecessary outings, and even closed his shop early just to stay safe.
As I began working with data on chronic disease prevalence across Lebanon, I kept thinking about people like Samer; individuals whose health risks existed long before COVID-19 arrived. It made me wonder:
Do districts with more people like Samer also end up reporting more COVID-19 cases?
At first, the logic seemed simple:
more chronic conditions should mean higher vulnerability, and higher vulnerability should mean more cases.
But once I visualized the data, the story turned out to be more complicated than that.
When we look at Baabda, Samer’s home district, the pattern is exactly what we expect.
Baabda and Matn have a high chronic disease prevalence which explains why they recorded the highest number of COVID-19 cases. These districts appear in red in the visualization because they represent the expected relationship:
high chronic disease prevalence accompanied by high COVID-19 case counts.
Most other districts show the same downward pattern: fewer chronic illnesses tend to come with fewer reported infections.
It’s the straightforward story we anticipate.
Until one district breaks it.
While exploring the data, Akkar immediately stood out.
Unlike Baabda or Matn, Akkar shows relatively low COVID-19 case numbers despite having a high prevalence of chronic diseases.
At first glance, this shouldn’t happen. But Akkar tells a different health story.
Akkar is less dense, has fewer specialized medical centers, and mobility patterns differ.
But an important social factor also played a role: many residents initially believed COVID-19 was “just a flu”, something exaggerated, not dangerous. Because of that, people were far less likely to get tested, especially when symptoms were mild or unclear.
So, the low case numbers may not reflect low infections, they reflect low detection.
Akkar shows us that vulnerability isn’t only biological or medical. Sometimes it’s cultural, structural, or tied to trust in the health system itself.
That was the moment when the visualization stopped being merely a chart and became a real narrative.
People like Samer live in districts where both chronic disease and COVID-19 risks were high and highly visible.
But in Akkar, people with the same medical vulnerabilities faced a quieter, more hidden risk, one that doesn’t always show up in official numbers but still shapes their health outcomes.
This is the heart of the story: patterns tell us what usually happens, but exceptions reveal what we might be missing.
Understanding these mismatches matters.
High-case, high-risk districts like Baabda and Matn may need more hospital capacity and emergency planning.
High-risk, low-case districts like Akkar may need earlier outreach, awareness campaigns, and accessible screening, especially in communities that may initially resist testing.
If we focus only on case counts, we risk overlooking communities that need protection long before outbreaks become visible.
When I think back to Samer, closing his shop early every night, hoping to stay healthy, I’m reminded that data becomes meaningful when it reflects real people.
In public health, the story doesn’t live only in the trend.
It lives in the exception.
Because that’s where we discover the next challenge before it appears.
by gji02 | Nov 20, 2025 | Dashboard, Uncategorized, Visualization
A personal journey into the places we love, the beauty we overlook, and the opportunities we’re losing
Lebanon is a country overflowing with natural beauty, history, culture, and authentic local experiences. A place where even the smallest town holds a story, a scent of zaatar from a bakery at dawn, the echo of church bells or the call to prayer drifting across the valley, the laughter of families gathered near rivers, old souks, and mountain trails.
These moments stay with us.
They shape who we are.
They remind us of a Lebanon that feels peaceful, grounding, and full of life.
But beneath the familiar hotspots we all rush to, there is a deeper truth, a truth rarely captured in brochures or tourism campaigns.
Many Lebanese towns already hold everything a thriving tourism ecosystem needs… except support.
Growing up here, these towns shaped my identity. Their landscapes, their people, their rhythm, all felt alive.
Yet as I grew older, I began to notice something painful:
The towns we love are often the ones left behind.
Where Beauty Lives but Support Does Not
Before looking at individual towns, I started from a broader question:
Do the regions of Lebanon with high tourism appeal receive the infrastructure support they need?
As Tourism Index shows how naturally attractive or culturally rich a region is, the Infrastructure Capacity refers to the services that allow tourism to function (cafés, restaurants, accommodations, facilities, etc.)
Some towns rise high on the “Tourism Index”, but fall flat on actual investments.
While many regions score well on tourism attractiveness, their infrastructure such roads, accommodations, public spaces, services, and tourism support systems lag far behind, making it difficult for visitors to stay, explore, and contribute economically.
This mismatch isn’t just a technical imbalance. It reflects a deeper, more emotional reality.
Some towns are seen, while others are not.
Some receive attention, while others remain forgotten.
And the ones left behind are not lacking in beauty, they are lacking in support.
We already see what happens when beauty is supported. Regions like Baabda, Akkar, and Matn, all scoring high on both Tourism Index and infrastructure, thrive simply because they were given the basics. They are the proof of what every overlooked town could become with just a little support.
Beauty and heritage exist everywhere in Lebanon, yet so much of it continues to wait quietly for the support it deserves.
Each bar represents a town that has natural beauty or cultural heritage, but zero visible tourism development. These are places with stories, landscapes, and identity waiting silently for investment.
Over the years some Lebanese towns have received tourism-related initiatives.
But when we look only at towns that already have attractions, a striking pattern appears:
Most of them, despite having natural, cultural, or historical treasures , received no initiatives at all.
No projects;
No funding;
No development;
No strategy;
Just silence.
The Hardest Truth: Even the Most Attractive Towns Receive Nothing
Some may argue:
“Maybe those towns don’t have attractions.”
But when we look closely at towns that already possess attractions, the painful truth becomes impossible to deny.
Potential without support becomes a burden. Towns that could thrive remain stuck. Communities that could flourish stay stagnant. And the tourism narrative becomes narrower, excluding places that rightfully belong in it.
The towns most ready to be activated are often the ones completely overlooked.
3 out of 4 received no support. None.
This is not a coincidence.
It is not a gap.
It is a systemic misalignment between where potential exists and where initiatives are delivered.
These are towns where: visitors already come, landscapes already impress, heritage already exists, infrastructure is partially there. Yet development never reaches them.
Looking at the Data as a Lebanese Citizen
When I step back, not as a student, not as an analyst, but as someone who grew up here, the message becomes clear:
-
We have so much beauty, but we overlook it.
-
We have so much potential, but we do not unlock it.
-
We have communities waiting, but no one comes.
-
We have foundations ready, but not activated.
The problem is not the towns.
The problem is the absence of action.
Every chart you saw above points to the same conclusion:
Lebanon’s opportunity is not in discovering new places, it is in believing in the ones we already have.
Imagine what would happen if:
Aley’s cafés received marketing and infrastructure upgrades, Akkar’s hiking trails were formalized Byblos’ surrounding villages received preservation grants Hasbaya’s guesthouses were connected to tourism.
platforms, Baalbek-Hermel’s rural attractions were promoted, Marjeyoun’s landscapes were protected and activated…
These are not dreams. These are realistic, steps, and now we know exactly where we should begin.
Lebanon does not need to invent new beauty.
It simply needs to believe in the beauty it already has.
The potential is real.
The foundations exist.
The opportunity is now.
What we need… is action.
Let’s stop waiting for “better times.”
