Egypt bans regular syringes by 2020

CAIRO – 30 April 2019: Egypt announced that regular syringes will be totally banned and will be substituted by self-destructing syringes by July 2020, as per a decision issued by the Ministry of Health.

“The regular syringes will be substituted by self-destructing ones, to prevent reusing these syringes [regular ones] and to reduce disease infection,” said Health Ministry Spokesperson Khaled Megahed. The decision which was issued on Thursday, came to maintain the achievements of the "100 Million Health" initiative, which was launched by President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi to eradicate Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) and chronic diseases, he added.

The Ministry also decided to use only the SoloShot syringes for polio vaccinations. By applying the new decision, Egypt will produce 2 billion syringes annually, the spokesperson said

To wipe out diseases that transmit through reusing syringes since 2015, The Ministry of Health in cooperation with the World Health Organization (WHO) has adopted Safety Injection Program to cut down the reuse of regular syringes, which was one of main causes of the spread of Hepatitis C Virus.

Former Minister of Health Adel Al-Awady said in a press conference in 2015 that eight to ten million Egyptians are being infected with Hepatitis C due to unsafe injection.

In 2015, Egyptian government has announced a plan to establish a factory to produce self-destruct syringes.

Additional reporting by Walid Abdelsalam