CAIRO: Egypt's Ministry of Health announced six swine flu related deaths on Wednesday and Thursday, raising the death toll to 39, the ministry's spokesman Abdel Rahman Shahin said. On Thursday, the ministry announced the death of a 39-year-old man in the governorate of Gharbeya who had severe respiratory problems and was put in the intensive care unit on a ventilator. His medical history included a surgery removing the left lobe of the lung. The second, case was that of a 58-year-old man from Assiut who was a leukemia patient who also suffered from enlargement of the liver and the spleen as well as problems in the lungs, heart and high blood pressure. On Wednesday, four people passed away from swine flu setting the record for the highest number of swine flu deaths to take place in a single day. The ministry had announced the death of a 14-year-old boy in Beheira governorate, who was admitted to hospital last Sunday in a coma. He was also suffeirng from a high fever, seizures and severe pneumonia, for which he was placed in the intensive care unit and put on a ventilator. The second case is a 21-year-old woman from Qena governorate suffering from pneumonia with a medical history including rheumatic heart and problems in the mitral valve and the aortic valve. The third case announced was of a 38-year-old man from Giza who had diabetes and was hospitalized with severe respiratory problems and difficulty breathing. The fourth case was that of a 35-year-old man from Sohag governorate who complained of severe pneumonia. "We are expecting the number of swine flu cases to increase exponentially in the coming months of the winter season, said Amr Kandil, deputy minister of health for precautionary measures. "The death rate is on the rise as the number of cases has increased, however those who have died of the H1N1 virus have a medical history which includes chronic illeness that have caused the complications, he explained. Kandil pointed out that the majority of deaths happened to be of patients in their twenties but this is due to the fact that approximately 55 percent of those who got the virus in Egypt are between five and 22 years old. In related news, Minister of Health Hatem El-Gabali has referred to a disciplinary committee doctors who had signed off on the health certificates of five Egyptian pilgrims who passed away while performing the Hajj this year. The doctors had allegedly issued the pilgrims the mandatory certificates that they were free of any chronic illnesses when they were not. There was one swine flu case among Egyptian pilgrims this year, a 54-year-old man who was diagnosed with the H1N1 virus in Medina, Saudi Arabia. There is currently one pilgrim who is suspected of having the virus but the test results had not come out by press time. According to the latest weekly swine flu update released by the Ministry of Health on Wednesday afternoon, the number of swine flu cases in Egypt has reached 4,124, an increase of 279 cases since the last update on Sunday. These include 1,468 cases found in schools and 227 cases in universities. The number of cases which have completely recovered from the virus in Egypt is 3,822, while 267 are still receiving treatment in hospitals.
