Egypt’s Minister of Health and Population Hala Zayed said that a fourth wave of coronavirus will likely hit Egypt at the end of September or beginning of October, if at all.
During statements to MBC Masr, Zayed explained: “We do not live separate from reality, and the pandemic crosses (the borders) and announces itself, and there are many Egyptian governorates with zero infections and zero deaths. This is evidence that the number of coronavirus infections has decreased, and there are only seven hospitals that receive coronavirus cases.”
Egypt’s third wave began subsiding at the beginning of June, after the government imposed a one-month partial lockdown on businesses and pushed authorities to strictly enforce its precautionary measures.
Zayed added that the ministry continues to provide services to those infected with the virus, but is working toward vaccinating the largest number of people possible against the virus, especially healthcare workers and the elderly.
Egypt’s Health and Population Ministry reported on Monday the lowest COVID-19 death count since the outbreak of the virus over a year ago.
The ministry said in a statement that just seven deaths were reported on Monday. The total number of deaths since the outbreak of the virus has now reached 16,403 cases.
The recent decline in cases and deaths brings some relief, as data shows that between the end of December 2020 and the beginning of July, the country’s seven-day average of daily deaths did not dip below 39.
The ministry also reported 110 new cases Monday, with the total case number reaching 283,212. It added that 879 patients have recovered and left from isolation hospitals on Monday, increasing the number of recovered cases to 219,291.
Egypt’s vaccination campaign that began in January has so far vaccinated 2.5 million people, out of Egypt’s population of 102 million.
Egypt is currently using China’s Sinopharm vaccine and the UK’s AstraOxford vaccine. The Ministry of Health has announced that it will soon begin producing Russia’s Sputnik V alongside Sinovac at VACSERA.
Egypt expects to receive, within days, two million doses of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine, followed by doses of Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen vaccine.
It will also employ the first doses of the locally produced Sinovac vaccine in early August.
