Driven by Despair, Lebanese Pharmacist Looks to Life Abroad

Driven by Despair, Lebanese Pharmacist Looks to Life Abroad

Pharmacist Rita El Khoury speaks in the middle of her empty pharmacy after selling her stock in preparation for her move to France with her husband, in Ballouneh, north of Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 21, 2021. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)

The shelves are bare at the Panacea pharmacy north of Beirut. Its owner, Rita El Khoury, has spent the past few weeks packing up her career, apartment and belongings before leaving Lebanon for a new life abroad.

For the 35-year-old pharmacist and her husband, and countless others feeling trapped in a country hammered by multiple crises, Lebanon has become unlivable.

Driven by financial ruin, collapsing institutions, hyperinflation and rapidly rising poverty, thousands have left since Lebanon's economic and financial crisis began in late 2019 — an exodus that accelerated after the massive explosion at Beirut's port last August, when a stockpile of improperly stored ammonium nitrates detonated, killing 211 people and destroying residential areas nearby.

Lebanon has been without a functioning government since, with political leaders deadlocked or complacent as the country hurtles toward total collapse. Fuel supplies are running out, leaving the country at risk of plunging into total darkness as power stations and generators run dry.

Now young to middle-aged professionals are leaving —