Hepatitis C campaign’s phase 2 includes Cairo, to start in December

CAIRO – 22 November 2018: Minister of Health Hala Zayed said that the second phase of the state’s campaign to end Hepatitis C in Egypt by 2020 will be implemented starting December 1.

The second phase will include 11 governorates, including Cairo, North Sinai, Red Sea, Ismailia, Suez, Kafr el-Sheikh, Menoufia, Beni Suef, Sohag, Luxor, and Aswan. The second phase is set to end late in February 2019.

In October, Zayed said that a campaign to test people for Hepatitis C would run from October 1 to the end of April 2019, stressing that patients would receive treatment for one to one and a half year to announce Egypt free from the blood-borne disease by 2020 or 2021. The initiative was launched by President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi.

Concerning the first phase of the campaign, Khaled Megahed, the Health Ministry spokesman said about 10 million citizens were examined for Hepatitis C within 90 days. Zayed revealed that 422,000 people of the total number of people examined tested positive for Hepatitis C.

She earlier said that the tests revealed that 4.5 percent of the examined citizens as part of the campaign’s first phase tested positive for Hepatitis C.

The first phase of the campaign was carried out in nine governorates including Alexandria, Damietta, Qalyubia, Port Said, Marsa Matrouh, South Sinai, Beheira, Fayoum and Assiut.

In 2014, the World Health Organization (WHO) stated that at least one in 10 Egyptians aged between 15 and 59 are infected, adding that the virus kills an estimated 40,000 Egyptians a year due to lack of awareness.

Hence, the government has been making strides to combat hepatitis C by launching the national anti-HCV program across Egypt to eliminate the hepatitis C virus (HCV) under the directive of President Sisi. The efforts of the campaign were recognized by the WHO in 2016 during a visit by WHO Director-General Margret Chan.

Since the launch of the program, 1.4 million citizens infected with hepatitis C virus (HCV) have been treated, and the government is still looking to fully cure 1.5 million more during 2018.