Egypt cuts prices of COVID-19 PCR, antigen rapid tests for citizens, foreigners

CAIRO – 2 February 2022: The Egyptian government announced cutting prices of the coronavirus PCR and antigen rapid tests for citizens and foreigners.

As per the decision, the PCR tests for Egyptians will be EGP 650 instead of EGP 900, while a PCR test for foreigners will cost EGP 750 instead of EGP 1,200.

Antigen rapid tests for Egyptians and foreigners will be EGP 175 and EGP 225 respectively instead of EGP 250 and EGP 320.

Egypt has been fighting the fourth coronavirus wave for months amid a rapid surge in coronavirus cases in light of the spread of the coronavirus Omicron, which, according to health officials, became the dominant strain in Egypt.

Egypt has received all types of coronavirus vaccines and also approved the emergency use of Merck’s molnupiravir coronavirus drug and allowed five companies to locally manufacture the drug.

The country also received its first shipment of AstraZeneca’s Evusheld coronavirus antibody drug earlier this month, comprising 15,000 doses.

Since the beginning of the vaccination campaign early last year, Egypt has administered a total of 64,407,886 million vaccine doses to people in the country.

A total of 37,425,628 Egyptian citizens have received their first Covid-19 dose of the vaccine, while other 26,360,054 million have received the second dose all around the country, according to spokesperson of the Health Ministry Hossam Abdel Ghaffar.

He noted that 622,204 citizens received the third [booster] dose of vaccine against coronavirus.