News on Africa

Swine flu kills 56 in Egypt since October

2010-12-27T12:30:45Z

CAIRO (Reuters) - A resurgent H1N1 swine flu virus has infected 1,172 people in Egypt and killed 56 since October 8, a Ministry of Health official said on Monday.

The virus has infected 16,373 people, of whom 281 died, since it was first reported in Egypt in June 2009, said the official, who asked not to be named.

H1N1 flu broke out in 2009 and...

Deaths from H1N1 in the United States: Statistics and analysis

2010-11-29T15:18:17Z

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Pandemics and notable epidemics in the 21st century

2010-11-29T15:15:49Z

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Differences between a pandemic and an endemic

2010-11-29T15:15:45Z

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Deadly Diseases to Avoid

2010-11-03T09:39:42Z

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Swine Flu the Big Hoax

2010-11-03T09:35:32Z

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Cairo's zabaleen want only respect in a rubbish life

2010-04-28T22:15:48Z

Children stop their game of marbles and scatter as rubbish-laden trucks trundle up their dusty street, swarming with flies and grinding dead vermin beneath their wheels.

The sight -- and smell -- is all too familiar in Zarayib, meaning "the Sties", a shanty-town in northeast Cairo where the zabaleen make their living by sifting through garbage in search of anything recyclable.

Before the Egyptian authorities a year ago ordered a total pig cull in the face of the outbreak of s...

Mexico detects first mutation of swine flu

2010-03-03T17:15:51Z

Mexican officials said Wednesday they have confirmed the first mutation of the A(H1N1) flu virus in a girl who survived the infection.

Health Minister Jose Angel Cordova told Mexican journalists that the case was the first confirmed mutation of the swine flu virus, though there were 423 other suspected cases.

He said the girl was treated two months ago at a hospital in North America and some European countries, the head of the World Health Organization said Tuesday.

The worst of the swine flu outbreak is over in the United States, Saudi Arabia for the annual hajj, health authorities said on Saturday only a few days before the massive Muslim gathering reaches its peak.

An Indian man, a Moroccan woman and a Sudanese man -- all aged 75 -- died from A(H1N1), as had a 17-year-old girl from Nig...

Four pilgrim deaths from swine flu ahead of hajj

2010-04-16T08:58:20Z

Four pilgrims in Saudi Arabia for the annual hajj pilgrimage have died of swine flu, the health ministry said in a statement carried by the official SPA news agency on Saturday.

It said a Moroccan woman, a Sudanese man and an Indian man -- all aged 75 -- had died from A(H1N1), as had a 17-year-old girl from Nigeria, Africa's most populous country, Health Minister Babatunde Osotimehin said Wednesday.

"The first case of the influenza A(H1N1), otherwise called swine flu, has been reported in Nigeria of a nine-year-old American girl residing in World Health Organisation said Friday.

This is an increase of 210 fatal cases from a week ago when 4,525 deaths were recorded, the UN health agency said in its weekly update of the pandemic.

Most deaths occurred in the Americas ...

Swine flu causes first Egyptian school closure

2010-04-16T09:49:47Z

Egypt on Thursday announced the closure of a Christian school in Cairo because of swine flu, the education system's first casualty of the (A)H1N1 virus.

The College of the Mother of God will close for two weeks following the discovery of three swine flu cases among pupils, the health and education...

Swine flu toll climbs to 4,525: WHO

2010-04-16T09:54:38Z

At least 4,525 people have died from swine flu infections since the A(H1N1) virus was uncovered in April, the World Health Organisation said Friday.

This is an increase of 417 fatal cases from a week ago when 4,108 deaths were recorded, the UN health agency said in its weekly update of the pandemic.

Most deaths occurred in the Americas ...

Egypt reports third flu death

2010-04-16T09:54:40Z

Egypt on Friday reported the third swine flu-related death in the country, where over 1,000 cases of the disease have been reported.

A 23-year-old woman from the Giza province died of the A(H1N1) virus, bringing to three the number of deaths since the disease first appeared, health ministry spokesman Abdel Rahman Shahin told the official Marzouka Beshir, pointing to a pile of rubbish rotting under the blazing sun in Imbaba, a working class neighbourhood in Cairo.

In their overcrowded areas, overflowing with litter, many like this 52-year-old Egyptian woman, have trouble coming to grips with the dramatic measures taken by authorities to combat the A(H1N1) flu.

Over 900 cases of s...

Egypt orders foreign schools closed over swine flu: ministry

2010-04-16T10:18:12Z

Egypt has ordered foreign schools and universities to close until October 3 over worries about swine flu, with local schools having already been told to delay opening until then, a health ministry official said on Wednesday.

Egyptian universities and schools had been set to begin their academic year the last week of September, but foreign ones started earlier this month. The government decided to delay the school year last week, the officia...

Egypt records second death from swine flu

2010-04-16T10:28:30Z

An Egyptian woman has died of swine flu in the second death related to the A(H1N1) virus since July, state television reported on Sunday.

"The health ministry has announced the second death due to swine flu in a 25-year-old woman from Dahaqliya" province in the Nile Delta, the report said.

The first victim, also a 25-year-old woman, died in July after returning to Egypt from Muslim p...

How to cure diseases before they have even evolved

2010-10-22T07:51:28Z

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Egypt to order five million doses of flu vaccine

2010-04-16T10:56:33Z

Egypt is to order five million doses of swine flu vaccine, Deputy Health Minister Nasser al-Sayyed told AFP on Friday, sufficient to immunise 2.5 million of Egypt's nearly 80 million population.

"Egypt will buy five million doses as soon as the vaccine becomes available," Sayyed said, adding that the order could be increased to 10 million doses depending on the evolution of the...

S. Africa registers first swine flu death

2010-04-16T11:01:26Z

South African health authorities on Monday announced the death of a 22-year-old student who tested positive for swine flu, the first fatal victim of the virus in sub-Saharan Africa.

"He died on the 28th, but there had to be some testing done to ensure the cause of death. It was the A (H1N1) influenza," said F...

No change to hajj quotas with flu curbs: Riyadh

2010-04-16T11:09:48Z

Saudi Arabia is likely to ban the elderly and children from the hajj this year to limit the risk of swine flu, but this will not change country quotas for the pilgrimage, a health official said on Saturday.

Dr. Khaled Marghlani, spokesman for the Saudi health ministry, said the government is expected to implement recommendations to block people older than 65 and y...

Arab health ministers to ban elderly, young from pilgrimage

2010-04-16T11:12:17Z

Arab health ministers agreed on Wednesday to ban certain people including the elderly and young children from pilgrimage to Mecca in an effort to contain the spread of swine flu.

"Hajj and umrah will continue with some conditions," Ibrahim al-Kerdani, World Health Organisation spokesman in

Global health officials mull how to slow swine flu

2010-06-12T07:40:33Z

Some Muslim countries are advising pregnant women not to attend the hajj pilgrimage. China is quarantining any visitor suspected of having a fever, while priests in New Zealand have been banned from placing Communion wafers on worshippers' tongues.

It's all part of a global effort to slow the spread of swine flu until a vaccine is ready, although experts are divided on whether the measur...

Egypt reports first swine flu case in Mecca pilgrim

2010-04-16T11:38:33Z

Egypt has confirmed the first swine flu case in an Egyptian returning from Saudi Arabia after performing the Muslim pilgrimage, a newspaper reported on Thursday.

The 28-year-old man was found to have contracted the A(H1N1) virus during Umra, or lesser pilgrimmage, to Mecca, health ministry spokesman Abdel Rahman Shahin said, quoted by the state...

More Mideast states report first swine flu cases

2010-06-12T07:40:53Z

Jordan, Qatar and Yemen reported Tuesday their first cases of swine flu, all in arrivals from abroad, widening the scope of the disease across a region that had once been largely free of the virus.

Together with new cases reported in several other Middle East countries afflicted by the virus, the number of people infected in the region has risen ...

Egypt swine flu cases rise to 18

2010-04-16T11:49:55Z

Egypt reported three new cases of swine flu on Saturday, as two children and a Colombian woman tested positive for the A(H1N1) virus, bringing to 18 the total.

A health ministry official told state news agency Mena the new cases were a 45-year-old Colombian woman and two children aged seven and eight, one of them a dual US and Egyptian citizen and the other a Canadian-Egyptian.

They arrived separately in

Toddler latest swine flu case in Egypt

2010-04-16T11:51:22Z

An 18-month-old boy tested positive for swine flu in Egypt on Thursday, the state news agency MENA reported, as the World Health Organisation told diplomats it was officially declaring a pandemic.

The dual US and Egyptian citizen arrived in Cairo from the Egypt on Wednesday, a day after five Americans tested positive for the disease in a Cairo campus residence, health ministry officials said.

One case was reported in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria and the other in Cairo, ministry spokesman

Egypt: 2 new cases of swine flu

2010-04-16T11:52:47Z

Two more people in Egypt have tested positive for swine flu bringing the total number of those infected in the country to 10, the spokesman for the Health Ministry said Wednesday.

Abdel Rahman Shahine said that the two new cases had recently returned from the United States. One is an Egyptian citizen who has now been hospita...

Egypt: 5 more Americans test positive to swine flu

2010-04-16T11:54:56Z

5 more Americans at unversity in Cairo have swine flu, Egypt health minister says

The number of U.S. citizens infected with swine flu at the American University in Cairo rose to seven, after five more cases were diagnosed ...

Five more cases of swine flu in Cairo dorm

2010-04-16T11:53:31Z

Five new cases of Americans infected with swine flu were discovered at a Cairo university dormitory on Tuesday, Egypt's health ministry said, bringing the total number of cases there to seven.

The American University of Cairo (AUC) residence in the upscale neighbourhood of Zamalek was quarantined ...

Five more cases of swine flu in Cairo

2010-04-16T11:53:49Z

Five new cases of swine flu infection were discovered at a Cairo campus dormitory on Tuesday, Egypt's health minister Hatem el-Gabali told state-news agency MENA.

The American University of Cairo's campus residence in the upscale neighb...

Saudi Arabia reports 2nd case of swine flu

2010-04-16T11:58:53Z

An official from the Saudi Health Ministry has announced the country's second case of swine flu.

Khaled al-Merghalani told the Associated Press Sunday that a Saudi student studying in the U.S. tested positive for the disease after landing in the western seaport of

Egypt swine flu case is Africa's first

2010-04-16T11:59:35Z

A girl who had travelled from the United States has been confirmed as Egypt's first case of swine flu and also the first to be reported on the African continent.

The 12-year-old with US and Egyptian nationality was quarantined by health workers at Cairo airport on Monday after she showed symptoms of the disease, United States and the first case was recorded in Tokyo.

The announcement in the Japanese capital that a 16-year-old high school girl had caught (A)H1N1 on a trip to New York underlined the scale of the challenge to contain ...

Africa braces for swine flu

2010-04-16T12:27:45Z

Africa has so far been spared by the swine flu epidemic but veterinary and health officials are bracing for the deadly virus, fearing the continent could end up the worst hit.

According to the World Health Organisation, A(H1N1) influenza has caused 1,500 infections on four continents. Mexico, where the virus was fi...

Outbreak News

2010-10-21T09:31:55Z

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Africa scrambles to prevent arrival of swine flu

2010-04-16T12:30:00Z

African nations are scrambling to prevent swine flu from reaching a continent already struggling with the burden of AIDS and malaria, fearing an outbreak could wreak much more devastation than in North America or Europe.

There have been no confirmed cases of the virus in Africa, and medical workers have stepped up surveillance at airports...

Swine flu leaves Southern Hemisphere out in cold

2010-04-16T12:31:37Z

Doctors: Swine flu vaccine won't be ready in time for coming Southern Hemisphere winter

The Southern Hemisphere has been mostly spared in the swine flu epidemic. That could change when winter starts in coming weeks with no vaccine in place, leaving half the planet out in the cold.

So far, the most affected nations have been in North America and Europe, which...

Swine Flu Unleashes Epidemic of Prejudice

2010-10-21T09:31:44Z

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Egypt begins pig slaughter in earnest

2010-10-13T14:35:56Z

Egypt began a controversial slaughter of the nation's 250,000 pigs in earnest on Saturday, despite the WHO saying there was no evidence the animals were transmitting swine flu to humans.

One hundred pigs were slaughtered in Alexandria and government workers began transporting an estimated 28,0...

Swine Flu Gets a Makeover

2010-10-21T09:31:31Z

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Egypt's call to kill pigs amid flu scare ridiculed

2010-04-16T12:35:01Z

In Egypt, a call to kill pigs because of swine flu fears ridiculed as bad policy

Egypt's government was hoping to look strong and proactive in the swine flu scare with its decision to slaughter all the country's pigs, after taking heavy criticism at home for poor planning and corruption in past crises.

But instead, some Egyptians called the move a knee-jerk overreaction that even the Egypt's lower house of parliament called on Tuesday for the nation's 250,000 pigs to be killed immediately because of fears over the spread of swine flu, state news agency MENA reported.

"The People's Assembly urged the government to immediately start culling pigs and not to relocate pig-breeding farms away from residential areas for fear of the spread of swine flu," MENA said.

Egypt's 80-million population consists mainly of Muslims,...

Nigeria allays fears over outbreak of swine flu

2010-04-16T13:17:17Z

Nigeria's health authorities on Tuesday claimed they were ready to cope with an outbreak of swine flu in the oil-rich west African country of 140 million inhabitants.

"The federal government is fully prepared to contain any outbreak of swine flu in the country," Health Minister Babatunde said in a statement published in the local media.

Nigeria is Africa's most populous nation.

The...

Mideast Egypt Church Attack

2011-01-04T14:32:25Z

Angry Copts chant anti-government slogans during a protest before clashing with Egyptian riot police in Cairo, Egypt, late Monday, Jan. 3, 2011. The head of Egypt's Coptic Orthodox Church appealed to the government on Monday to address Christians complaints about discrimination to ease tensions as fierce riots broke out in the capital following a New...

APTOPIX Mideast Egypt Church Attack

2011-01-04T14:32:25Z

Two Coptic men, center and unseen, warn off two others wielding kitchen knives, left and right, who were trying to kick down the doors of a mosque, seen behind, during heavy clashes between Coptic youths and riot police, in the streets outside the Saints Church and a neighboring hospital, in Alexandria, Egypt, Saturday, Jan. 1, 2011. A powerful bomb, possibly from a suicide attacker, exp...

Egypt Al Qaida

2011-01-04T14:32:22Z

FILE - In this Nov. 5, 2010 file photo, hundreds of Egyptian Muslims gather following prayers outside Ibrahim Mosque in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria, Egypt, protesting against what they allege was Egypt's Coptic Church holding two women captive for converting to Islam. In the weeks before the New Year's Day suicide bombing of an...

South Sudan Bashir

2011-01-04T05:30:43Z

Pro-separation activists hold signs and chant pro-independence slogans outside the Juba airport in southern Sudan where Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir arrived on Tuesday, Jan. 4, 2011. President Bashir and his government in Khartoum support the ongoing unity of Sudan, a position fiercely contested by south...

APTOPIX South Sudan Bashir

2011-01-04T03:31:28Z

The President of the Republic of Sudan Omar al-Bashir, center, is escorted by Salva Kiir Mayardit, the Vice President of the Republic of Sudan , left,as he arrives at the airport in the southern Sudanese capital of Juba on Tuesday, Jan. 4, 2011. Bashir visited Juba just five days before southerners are se...