Egypt - Concerns about Lack of Timely Disease Information

[Laidback Al]

Since January 28th, FluTrackers members have been unable to access media reports or official government sites regarding infectious diseases inside Egypt.

I do not see any disease information in the paper. Also, none of the other papers I checked are online with a current edition.

So - still no disease information via the newspapers in Egypt.

The Ministry of Health site is also still down.

and

Just a reminder that H1N1 and H5N1 are not the only severe public health threat endangered by the current situation in Egypt:

The Alkhurma hemorrhagic fever virus is likely endemic in Egypt:

http://www.flutrackers.com/forum/showthread.php?t=155613 ,

and an undiagnosed illness in Alexandria that may have been plague, the Alkhurma virus, or something else was reported in Alexandria in summer 2009:

http://www.flutrackers.com/forum/showthread.php?t=110907

We are now currently in H5N1 influenza season in Egypt. In the past nine weeks (since the last week of November 2010) there have been 9 human H5N1 infections confirmed by WHO and one more reported by the Egypt Ministry of Health (link) before the internet connections in Egypt were severed.

If news and media blackouts on infectious disease continue for the next several days, we could predict at least one new human H5N1 infection in this period (based on the current trend), even if it is not reported during the current crisis.