Re: Egypt - Closure of Schools / Classrooms Due to H1N1. Or for failure to follow Ministry of Health or Education requirments for influenza control.
Khaled Salah writes .. Swine flu in our house
Wednesday, December 23rd, 2009 - 17:00
Quoting the weekly edition
I ask God Almighty to bring peace to the heart of every father and mother in Egypt, if God wills him to hear this news very hard, massive oppression, that the influenza virus has struck deep in the body of one of his sons Unexpectedly, and without prior notice, and despite all the health precautions and preventive measures at home and in school.
I ask God to heal from this trauma, but does not write to you ruggedness of this event, I invite you now have myself tasted the bitterness of this news last week, after injuring my daughter Feroze, 11 years, disease (H1N1), known as swine flu, I ask God to give you well not only of the disease, but which is followed by other shocks, you confirm beyond any doubt that we are not yet ready for the major human pandemic by the Minister of Health Dr. Hatem mountain, but are not able to health response in public hospitals or in private, and we have no position to protect ourselves and our children if the incident occurred.
This story deserves to relate it, since I entered for the first time in the eye of the storm directly, I know what I could not see it from several sites in the press just now tell you my story with the swine flu, only to discover how much we are naked in the face of all the ills of the world, and how we are weak people and government, without consciousness, and without medical preparations, and no one really reassure your heart, or information on which to save your family.
Storm is not in influenza, but in all this mess, and medical management we have in the face of this virus, and the tragedy is not in the disease, which is as much of God, accept the good and bad, but faltering in the decisions not based on knowledge or lean on the truth.
The first tragedy .. Own laboratory
The temperature gradually increases Feroz Saturday evening before last, in fear of the swine flu pay my wife to rush towards one of the labs, to complete the analysis of the virus in the hope that this warming is caused by seasonal influenza, not the dreaded virus, who spent nearly 90 people at this writing, we rushed to contact the laboratory, which sent delegates to get the sample, and it began to confusion, we asked the young man coming from the lab, if we want rapid analysis and price of 300 pounds, or analysis (P. C. R), which needs to be 24 hours, and price 475 pounds?
We were not ready to answer, rushed to contact one of the doctors who confirmed that rapid analysis is questionable in its outcome, and does not reflect the truth, and advised to make our analysis of the second and wait for 24 hours, and when you get this answer I asked myself: What drives the labs to raise the question as , and you are viewing this choice to the parents, if rapid analysis is not fattening and sing from hunger? Why allow the Ministry of Health laboratories for conducting this analysis, the outcome was in doubt?
Enough of this, this is not the time for questions, and girls under the repression of the high temperature non-stop, so said my wife, we chose the analysis (P. C. R), although our noses and we are submissive, and Toklna to God (compresses) and Antipyretic waiting for God Forbid Almighty.
The next day the lab contact us to convey to us the news (positive result) infected with avian H1N1 your daughter and you can receive the result now! .. Soagafz here over the panic and hysteria that swept through the grief the family, and Onqlk directly to the details of the experiment to find out who can Tqas every family in Egypt as a result of hesitation and confusion and mismanagement, but also know from my experience how can we face, God forbid, a dilemma in this way .
I asked the employee at the lab who gave me the result of the analysis, whether the management of the plant looked the Ministry of Health to take the result is necessary for the school, or the inclusion of this case in the statistical department, dealing with architecture, which we inhabit, or any other actions, the answer was a surprise (not )! Laboratory does not any role in informing the Ministry of Health, does not mean whatsoever that is inserted into the situation within the daily statistics, or the attention of schools or to initiate any action of any kind.
I could not here to blame the employee or blame the lab, but I surprised myself, hand analysis of the effect that my daughter was infected with influenza, without knowing exactly what is the next step, and how do I get Tamiflu, and should the school do about this new situation ?
Second tragedy .. Tamiflu
Contacted the director of a hospital diets on his mobile phone and briefed him on the situation of my daughter, who Valhmyat is interested in receiving these cases or exchange Tamiflu to my knowledge, time, and was surprised that the man denies the beginning of the lab analysis, and noted here that these plants were licensed and approved by the Ministry of Health , and when I asked him to get Tamiflu, according to this analysis, he said he was not competent to do so and the only medicine that is discharged in a department of the Ministry of Health.
You try to connect this administration to no avail, no one answers the phone has been a time was nine and a half late, so I decided to contact a private hospital that I know that they are equipped to handle cases of influenza was the answer, they are not, regardless of Tamiflu, and that we should wait until morning to contact the Ministry of Health while , and the doctors in the private clinic told me that they can not only receive critical situations.
So I became lost, there is no Fever Hospital is ready to accept the outcome of its own laboratory analysis, nor are they ready to conduct the analysis themselves, and the private hospitals do not receive only critical situations!!.
He admitted to you I did not find a way before me but to resort to the road I did not imagine I will have it again, I was a citizen I do not think I need to use a special relationship for the health service is supposed to be from my rights as natural, and also assumed that the government was preparing to several months ago, what was for me only to communicate directly with Dr. Abdel Rahman Shaheen Media Advisor to the Ministry of Health, and ask him directly help in this situation, I can not wait until the morning I know that my daughter infected with the virus, and I can transfer to a private hospital, and public hospitals supposed to provide the service in this position ready to recognize the results of its own laboratory!!.
I spoke directly to Dr. Rahman, who kindly sent a box of Tamiflu at home with his driver, to start taking the medicine Feroz in before her body Small virus rages, God forbid, with the arrival of the package I thank Dr. Abdul Rahman with all my heart, but at the same time I lament to our situation with all my heart also, what can you do a different father does not have the phone number of the counsel and the Ministry of Health? And what can you do if another family rushed to a private hospital, and refused to receive the case, or rushed to a hospital in the viruses and questioned the result of its own laboratory? All this under the pressure of panic and fear that the disease progresses to the extent which can not be cured.
The third tragedy .. The black market for Tamiflu
Now reached an explosive Tamiflu .. But what we do after that?
Also discovered that none of the doctors or information crucial decision, one in everything related to the disease, no one knows anything with certainty, the mess of the medical opinions do not stop, we ask under pressure from the fear of specialist doctors, we know about the next step , there is still with us this child, who lost his family Alfoltarin injection at the wrong time, we used to ask anxiously:
What cough medicine is appropriate here?
Do you continue to give them discount heat with Tamiflu?
Do you replace the discount heat if the temperature exceeded 38 degrees?
Questions and clear and direct answers, but it came to conflicting and contradictory, and based on any fact or scientific experiment, in the end I decided voluntarily to align myself to say my friend Dr. Hadi lamp which I am sure the scientific briefing and extensive knowledge, and his insistence on follow-up experiments at home and abroad, all Vatbat he said, praise God that he hit in each view, we prefer it, but also stood in front of a handful of questions: What people can do here that they do not have real information? And what brings us directly to each such chaos in the information? And what they pay doctors to differences of opinion in this way without a clear agenda and exhaustive answers to the Ministry of Health to be adopted to resolve this confusion, especially as families lose control and think carefully during this storm of tension?
Surprisingly, here in the middle of this tragedy is that all the friends of the doctors showed me the first time on the details of the black market for the drug Tamiflu in Egypt, I discovered that I simply did not need to speak to the Advisor to the Minister of Health to send me this dose of free, good God has divided, but I had to I know the black market for yarn packages in a large number of pharmacies in Egypt, but you'll be ready to be paid the invoice Valtammivlo rate ranged between 400 pounds and 470 pounds in Cairo alone, and can be up to double the prices in other provinces, and the price could jump to 600 pounds in the case of American varieties of medicine, and you can buy any amount you like packets of medicine as long as you ready to pay.
I admit to you without any hesitation, I took the initiative to buy up packages from the black market in preparation for any unexpected developments in the calculated transmission to any family member, I was not prepared in order to face the trauma again without processing, but at the same time lamented on what could be faced by any family the other, you can not find a way to this medication or can not meet the expense of buying on the black market in the event of a collision with clogged roads in the public and private hospitals in a way that surprised me the first time.
Fourth school tragedy ..
Once I got on the Feroz Tamiflu even started to think about her in school and in her class who probably picked up from the infection, I asked my wife to contact the school, to inform management on the outcome of the analysis to take the necessary precautions in the classroom, especially as the school had been closed a few weeks after the beginning of school year as a result of the large number of casualties in more than one season.
Considered from both sides to inform the school is part of our duty to the inevitable, so do not accommodate injuries, and the surprise was that the school had an obligation not to recognize the results of the labs at the decision of the Minister of Health, and our initiative to inform the administration was rather pointless, which is not pointless, it is the school administration informed grade students with the injury, or shared with colleagues, parents Feroz on what happened, as if nothing had happened, it was the results of the labs is outside the accounts of the ministry, and is out of school, here I do not understand the meaning of this, especially coming from the injury chapter without a doubt , and that what has happened in my daughter can be exposed to other disciples within the school.
That my wife did not succumb to this disregard of the school administration, and decided to take the initiative themselves to inform the people you know from the teachers of colleagues Feroze, in order to initiate each family to take appropriate precautions, and then followed by other cases that appeared in the school, revealed by analysis of the Ministry of Health, the decision was closed for three weeks.
I think you are not in need of proof that we live in a real mess, you do not know why the minister was allowed to laboratories for analysis, and regarded the decision of these plants without value, and you understand why you do not inform the ministry of these plants results in order to detect foci of infection and deal with, You can not understand what the role played by hospitals or general hospitals and fevers, and why is the distribution of Tamiflu centrally than one department in the Ministry of Health, and is responsible for the emergence of the black market for Tamiflu, and enter into Egypt, and who sold in massive amounts.
And can also be understood from a medical reference in Egypt with regard to treatment or the details, nor is responsible for identifying drugs associated with Tamiflu in the course of treatment, and what measures to be taken with the affected families to reduce the spread of infection in my case, for example, are not connected me by the Ministry of Health at all after I got my Tamiflu not be pursued any action in the building where I lived, or in my workplace and my wife.
Do not ask permission for the increase in the number of suspicious injuries, nor the mounting death toll from the virus, the answer is clear, before your eyes, all this chaos, manipulation, and conflict of medical opinions, and the absence of a clear order for Tamiflu, and the spread of the black market, and the absence of a mechanism to determine the role of private research laboratories in the analysis, then these prices for factor that cuts across the middle class families, and frequency in a hospital dietary analysis, and failure in dealing with the schools affected, and not recognize the results of analysis in dealing with private schools, are all factors that may help the spread of disease may be denied patients from early detection, or deprive patients of access to medicines easily, or access to care whenever needed during the battle with the virus.
And God is before and after.
