CAIRO: Egypt’s Ministry of Health reported two new cases of the H1N1 virus on Wednesday as the World Health Organization (WHO) announced the appearance of a strain resistant to Tamiflu.
There are now a total of 83 cases in Egypt, with the two testing positive yesterday being a young British man who recently arrived to Cairo from London and an Egyptian man just back from the US, according to a healthy ministry statement.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organization (WHO) said that it was informed by health officials in Denmark, Japan, Hong Kong and China of an H1N1 strain resistant to Tamiflu, the drug used to treat the virus.
“These viruses were found in patients who did not have severe diseases and all have recovered. Investigations have not found the resistant virus in the close contacts of these people, according to WHO’s statement.
The WHO stressed that the reported cases are not enough to indicate the “development of widespread antiviral resistance among pandemic H1N1 viruses.
“Based on this risk assessment, there are no changes in WHO’s clinical treatment guidance. Antiviral drugs remain a key component of the public health response when used as recommended.
In Egypt, Cabinet spokesperson Magdy Radi said in a statement that based on reports from the health ministry, the number of cases in the country is “still very limited, and 80 percent of the patients have recovered.
The Ministry of Health has inspected passengers coming to Egypt on some 10,685 planes and 1,353 ships from May 1 through July 5 to track the virus, the ministry statement said.
In that period, Egypt received 2.64 million passengers coming from infected countries, according to the Cabinet’s statement.
At print time on Wednesday, Israel had reported new 15 cases while New Zealand reported its fourth death from H1N1.
