Daily COVID-19 roundup: June 22

Editor’s note: The daily COVID-19 roundup is part of the Mada Morning Digest, our daily overview of what is making waves in the Arabic language press. If you want all the latest updates on COVID-19 and other leading stories — including coverage of the economy, foreign policy, Parliament, the judiciary, media and much more — to land in your mailbox each morning, subscribe for a free trial here. 

Here are the latest figures on COVID-19 as of Sunday, June 22:

These COVID-19 items made headlines in Egypt on Sunday:

• Death of Ghad Party member in Kafr al-Sheikh prompts mass resignation of local party leaders
  • Leaders of the Ghad Party in Kafr al-Sheikh have resigned en masse in protest over the party’s failure to respond to the death of General Abdel Latif al-Fahal, the party’s general secretary for Kafr al-Sheikh, who reportedly died several days ago due to COVID-19. The members who resigned expressed anger at the fact that the party did not issue an official statement on the general secretary’s death, and did not send party officials to express condolences. They also accused the party of neglecting the general secretary during his illness and after his death despite the fact that “he had dedicated his life to the party.

• The Health Ministry has decided to dispense treatment for COVID-19 patients who are isolating at home from health centers rather than hospitals. The ministry explained that this would allow hospitals to focus all of their attention on treating COVID-19 patients. Individuals who are isolating at home are advised to report to the nearest health center for treatment.
   
• Dispute over testing players in lead-up to beginning of football league
  • Chief Executive of the Egyptian Football Association Waleed al-Attar said Sunday that the Egyptian Premier League will not resume on July 25 after all.
    
    Attar said this was because a number of clubs have asked for more time to prepare their players for the competition, especially after the four-month break due to the COVID-19 outbreak. Attar added that the EFA will make a final decision on the return date soon.
    
    The decision to resume the league on July 25 was met with pushback from several Egyptian clubs, including title contestant regulars Zamalek SC and Ismailia FC, who said that the infection risk presented by returning to play was not worth winning the league.
     
  • In anticipation for the Egyptian Premier League to start up again, the government has provided free testing for all participating teams. Players and coaches from Al-Ahly Football Club were tested for COVID-19 on Sunday. Yet the Pyramids Football Club made a point of using its own resources to test its players, announcing Sunday that all its players and coaches had tested negative for COVID-19. Suspending all training, the Masr Football Club refused to take the tests offered by the government, saying that the government should provide the tests to those who truly need them. Nader Shawky, who heads the company that manages the Gouna Football Club, criticized Masr FC’s decision. “You should have thanked the state, paid for the tests and donated your share of the free tests to those who need them,” he said. 

Coexisting with coronavirus

• Egyptian travel agencies that organize hajj pilgrimage trips have called on both the Egyptian and the Saudi Arabian governments to clear up whether hajj will go ahead this year. Ehab Abdel Aal, a member of the Egyptian Travel Agents Association, noted that there is not much time left for companies to organize travel packages and that any further delay would rule out the trip this year.
   
• South Sinai Governor Khaled Fouda said Sunday that Italian tourists will begin to return to Egypt starting July 18. According to statements so far, commercial flights will be up and running as normal from July 1, while charter flights for tourists will be traveling only to South Sinai, the Red Sea and Matrouh. 

Strategy to counter COVID-19

• Arguing that the pandemic has drawn attention to the control that Big Pharma exerts over medical research in Egypt, Dr. Alaa Awad of the Theodore Bilharz Institute gave an interview to the Journalists Against the Pandemic page. Awad described how medical research on the SARS outbreak had made major strides, but was halted after the outbreak subsided and pharmaceutical companies deemed further research unprofitable. As for the COVID-19 pandemic, Awad said that the coming and going of various treatments is evidence of pharmaceutical companies engaging in a tussle over their share of the revenue.
   
• 403 ventilators are currently available at isolation hospitals, and 123 are currently in use, said Dr. Sherif Wadie, advisor for emergencies to the Health Ministry. He added that 85-90% of patients in the intensive care are COVID-19 cases at the moment.
   
• Wadie also that 86% of those who have died of COVID-19 in Egypt were suffering from chronic illnesses. This figure is lower than the 95% that Health Minister Health Hala Zayed reported earlier.
   
• The Teaching Hospitals Authority announced that it has carried out 2,000 dialysis sessions for COVID-19 patients for free.
   
• The private healthcare conglomerate Cleopatra Group has designated the Queens Hospital and Al-Kateb Hospital as isolation facilities for its companies’ employees.
   
• Calling for people to tone down hoarding, the Prime Minister Mostafa Madbuly said the government is exerting the utmost efforts to ensure there is a safe reserve of medicine and supplies.
   
• The Egyptian Drug Authority has revealed the quantities of the medication it has stockpiled for people isolating at home:
  • 982,568 boxes of Azithromycin pills
  • 474,401 bottles of Azithromycin in liquid form
  • 2,800,781 boxes of paracetamol pills
  • 650,000 bottles of paracetamol in liquid form
  • 1,008,700 packets of zinc pills
  • 1,228,442 boxes of vitamin C 
  • 95,000 boxes of vitamin C-zinc pills 

Who cares for the healthcare workers? 

• In news of how coronavirus affected workers on the front lines of the response to the pandemic on Sunday:
  • The Doctors Syndicate announced the death of two new doctors on Sunday: Dr. Gamal Sabry, who was an ENT consultant at the Tal al-Kebir Hospital in Ismailia, and Professor of Surgery at Al-Azhar University’s Faculty of Medicine Dr. Mohamed Abou Seteit 
  • Director of the Luxor isolation hospital Dr. Mohamed Saad Anwar said on Sunday that he has tested positive for COVID-19, and that he and two of his colleagues are isolating at the Luxor General Hospital.
     

Working with COVID-19

• Talk show host for the TEN TV channel Nashaa al-Deehy announced that he has entered self-isolation. Deehy did not disclose whether he had tested positive for COVID-19 or was isolating because he suspected he could have contracted the virus, though he did ask his followers to pray to help him overcome the ordeal.
   
• A statement from the Housing Ministry called on construction companies and contractors working on the new administrative capital to increase how many workers and how much equipment they’re using to make up for any delay caused by the restrictions caused by COVID-19. The government has set July 2021 as the final date for moving into the new capital.