Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi praised the Chinese experience in combating the coronavirus. In a phone conversation with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping on Monday, Al-Sisi expressed his aspiration to boost cooperation between health authorities in the two countries regarding the pandemic.
For his part, the Chinese president expressed his country’s readiness to provide Egypt with the needed assistance and equipment to contain the spread of coronavirus, known as COVID-19.
Both leaders agreed to increase the level of strategic collaboration between Cairo and Beijing regarding transferring the Chinese technology to Egypt and training the Egyptian cadres.
Following the conversation, President Al-Sisi comforted the people in Egypt on Twitter that he is following up the latest updates on the pandemic and the measures taken by the Ministry of Health to combat the virus.
He further called upon the citizens to abide by the governmental measures regarding COVID-19 in order to keep Egypt safe.
According to the most recent data from the Ministry of Health, the total number of coronavirus cases in Egypt is 327 cases with 14 deaths. Total 56 cases have recovered and discharged from hospitals.
Meanwhile, Egypt’s Armed Forces announced that Major General Shafea Abdel Halim Dawood, head of project management department in the Armed Forces Engineering Authority, has died of COVID-19, during the army’s efforts to control the virus spread.
He was the second senior army rank to die of coronavirus after Major General Khalid Shaltout, head of the water department in the Armed Forces.
Globally, the numbers are growing rapidly as infected people exceeded 354,677 at the time of writing, and the death toll reached 15,436. More than 100,462 people recovered.
As Europe has become the epicentre of the outbreak, Italy is now the main hotspot of the infection in Europe. Rome has recorded its highest death toll in one day, surpassing China and Iran, exceeding 800 deaths. The total deaths in Italy due to the pandemic were 5,476, with 59,138 infections so far. About 7,024people recovered though.
The United States is the second most affected country in the world. It has reported 35,530 infections with 473 deaths, while no cases have recovered according to the estimations of John Hopkins University.
Iran, which represents the epicentre of the outbreak in the Middle East, reported 23,049 infected cases with 1,812 deaths until the time of writing, while 8,376 people have recovered amid the country’s lack of medical equipment under the US sanctions.
In Egypt, the latest of the state measures was the decision of Cairo governorate to close the Al-Ataba market and remove street vendors’ stalls from streets.
On Sunday, during a ceremony to celebrate Egyptian Woman Day, Al-Sisi emphasised that the government is dealing with the crisis of coronavirus with “full transparency,” and there is nothing to hide. “All coronavirus numbers reported by the government are accurate,” he said.
The president added, “Egyptian government is dealing with this matter [coronavirus outbreak] based on international standards and in coordination with World Health Organization (WHO).”
In a press conference on Monday, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the Director-General of WHO, said the world is rightly responding to COVID-19 with urgency and purpose. He called on the global community to harness that same urgency and purpose for the fight against tuberculosis – and for a healthier, safer, fairer world for everyone.
