Egypt's health minister, Hala Zayed, arrived in Italy yesterday for a "solidarity" visit, together two military planes bringing medical aid from Egypt.
Her trip was reportedly ordered by President Sisi who on Saturday posted a tweet offering to provide "all possible support" to "the governments...
Blog archive: All
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5th April 2020
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4th April 2020In a sudden reversal of policy, Israel's health ministry has announced a cutback in coronavirus testing. The World Health Organisation regards testing as an essential component in the battle against COVID-19 and Israel had been planning to increase testing levels to 10,000 a day by early next week...
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3rd April 2020In the Middle East and North Africa region, Algeria now has the highest death toll linked to coronavirus outside Iran. So far, 83 people have died in Algeria and the 25 deaths reported yesterday accounted for almost half of those in Arab countries. A major factor behind Algeria's high death rate...
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2nd April 2020The Egyptian authorities have been taking exception to suggestions that there are far more coronavirus cases in the country than official figures reveal. Last week, the Guardian's correspondent in Cairo was forced to leave after writing about a scientific study which said the real numbers...
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1st April 2020Egypt's efforts to control the spread of coronavirus are "good and reassuring", President Sisi claimed yesterday as the authorities reported 54 new cases and five more deaths. "In light of my following-up around the clock on all efforts and measures taken to confront the spread of coronavirus, I...
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31st March 2020During the last 24 hours, a further 145 coronavirus-related deaths have been reported in the Middle East and North Africa. Of these, 117 were in Iran and 28 in the rest of the region. Although the daily toll in Iran remains high, the trend is downwards and the latest figure is the lowest for...
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30th March 2020In most of the Middle East, as in many other parts of the world, social distancing is the order of the day. People are being urged to stay at home and minimise contact with others. Sensible as that might be, in the teeming slums of Cairo, in the camps for displaced people in Syria and Iraq, in the...
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29th March 2020One problem in monitoring the coronavirus pandemic is that nobody really knows how many people have been infected. A growing number of new cases can be one indicator of how fast the virus is spreading, but that has to be weighed against other factors. For example, the more people you test, the...
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28th March 2020Since the beginning of March striking differences have emerged in the course of the coronavirus epidemic among Arab countries – especially in the numbers of deaths. The graph below shows that Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and the UAE have all been relatively successful in controlling the epidemic...
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27th March 2020Anyone who still doubts that Egypt is heading for a coronavirus catastrophe should take a look at the picture above. It shows the health minister setting the worst possible example by holding a news conference in a room packed with more than 50 people. It's generally believed that Egypt has...
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26th March 2020Throughout the Middle East, governments of all political complexions are trying – and in many cases struggling – to check the spread of coronavirus. Lockdowns, curfews, quarantine – at home or in hospitals – and social distancing are the order of the day. But there's something else looming: Ramadan...
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25th March 2020Amid rapidly-growing numbers of new infections and the first two coronavirus-related deaths, Saudi Arabia is sealing off the cities of Riyadh, Mecca and Medina. From tomorrow, no one will be allowed to leave or enter. Movement between the kingdom's 13 administrative regions will also be...
