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Friday
Mar 12th

Egypt reports new H1N1 cases, now totalling 74 nationwide

Egyptian health authorities on Saturday reported two more cases of the H1N1 influenza in the country, increasing the number of cases in the country to 74, a statement from the ministry of health said here.

The ministry said that the two new carriers had recently arrived in Egypt from a broad. The carriers are a six-year-old Egyptian girl who returned to Cairoon 30 June from Britain and a 23-year-old student who arrived this week from Chile.

The ministry did not say whether they were quarantined after exhibiting symptoms.

The statement said both patients were currently receiving proper treatment and were in stable condition at a local Cairo hospital.

Also, ministry spokesman Abdel Rahman Shahine, said that at least 58 cases of previous infections had been cured. No person has died of the deadly influenza virus in Egypt to date.

Egypt, hit hard by the avian flu, fears that the H1N1 would mutate and combine with the H5N1 bird flu virus to cause a major virus scourge in the country.

The first H1N1 case in Egypt was reported on 2 June after a 12-year-old Egyptian-American girl, arriving from the US via The Netherlands, exhibited flu-like symptoms.

The initial fears brought on by the virus led to the government’s culling of 300,000 pigs in what they believed to be an effort to eradicate the virus.

Although evidence was revealed before the culling began that pigs were not responsible for what was being referred to as the Swine Flu at the time, the government went ahead with the killing anyway.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the disease has infected more than 77,000 worldwide and more than 330 people have died from the virus.
 
Cairo - 04/07/2009

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