A senior expert from the Geneva-based World Health Organization (WHO) has started a field visit to Libya to face the plague, which has recently hit the country coming from the West. The goal of the visit is to carry out a wide-scope investigation inside the Libyan territory, to monitor the epidemic and assess the situation of this deadly disease. The WHO reported that the expert is helping develop an effective system to face and contain the outbreak of the plague in time, and stated that according to international health regulations, the WHO itself will provide more general health information as soon as it receives it from the field visit. Dr. Hatem el-Gabaly, Egypt's Minister of Health, is due to receive a report from the WHO over the next few days with all the information concerning the visit, an assessment of the current situation and the potential health risks.
The WHO also warned of the danger posed on human life by a plague outbreak. It said the disease has appeared in a limited area in the region of Tobruk, adding that the plague is a disease which requires the use of decision-making mechanisms to assess and notify any factor that may constitute a globally-worrying public health emergency. The WHO Eastern Mediterranean office in Cairo issued a statement yesterday on the plague. It states that this is a bacterial disease caused by a bacterium called Yersinia pestis, which mainly affects wild rodents and is transmitted from one rodent to another through fleas infected with plague. As for human beings, they are infected if they are bitten by infected fleas. The statement points out that early diagnosis and rapid treatment are essential to reduce complications and deaths due to the plague, and that effective therapeutic interventions can lead to recovery in almost 100% of the cases if the disease is diagnosed in time.
