In a press conference on Wednesday following the cabinet's weekly meeting, Madbouly stated that this brings load-shedding schedules to an end.

He noted that halting the load-shedding plan does not mean there would be no outages in certain areas due to technical issues.

Madbouly explained that sometimes, apart from the load-shedding plan, a problem may occur in an area due to high temperatures, "causing a transformer to go out of service."

He noted that electricity could be cut for two or three hours in an area due to a technical issue with a transformer, stressing that if a problem occurs somewhere the government will intervene to solve it and contain it.

Madbouly revealed that the electricity crisis will be completely resolved by the end of this year.

He stated that the government has considered a scenario to prevent power outages next summer.

According to Madbouly, the daily consumption rate in recent days exceeded 37.5 gigawatts, an increase of more than 12 percent compared to the previous year.

He emphasized that the government aims to add 4 gigawatts to the electricity grid.

In June, the government extended the power cuts to three hours per day nationwide amid consumption levels, triggered by a gruelling heatwave this summer.

Meanwhile, the government has started implementing an emergency plan to import large quantities of mazut and natural gas to meet increased electricity consumption.

In July 2023, Egypt implemented a load-shedding programme that saw rolling power cuts of two hours across neighbourhoods nationwide.

Last week, the government said commercial shops would close by 10 pm starting in July, while pharmacies, supermarkets, and restaurants would close by 1 am to conserve electricity.

Medicine shortage crisis

PM Mostafa Madbouly stated that the government met with Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, Minister of Health and Population, and Ali El-Ghamrawy, Head of the Egyptian Drug Authority, to discuss the drug shortage crisis.

The Prime Minister added that the drug shortage crisis will be resolved within three months.

Madbouly also stated that the state's monthly needs for medicines and medical supplies cost approximately $250 million.

He explained that during the foreign currency crisis, the state could not secure these needs and meet these costs.

In addition, Madbouly highlighted that Egypt should have reserves of raw materials and medicines for seven months to ensure complete stability and continuing production.

He indicated that providing these raw materials to factories, their affiliated warehouses, central warehouses, and pharmacies is necessary, noting that the recent crisis led to a decline in reserves.

Furthermore, Madbouly stressed that the state was working to provide dollars to pharmaceutical factories at the official rate at a time when the cost of the dollar was much higher in the parallel market. "The state was keen, however, to secure dollars to prevent increased drug prices," he affirmed.

Madbouly also revealed that the state was incapable of fully meeting the needs of factories, which led to a decline in their strategic reserves. He stressed, however, that the situation improved after resolving the currency crisis.