File Photo: An Egyptian doctor makes a test during an unprecedented campaign that aims to test 50 million people to detect and treat hepatitis C patients in a bid to eliminate the disease by 2022, in Cairo, Egypt November 11, 2018. (Photo: Reuters)
More than 20 million Egyptians have been screened for hepatitis C and other non-communicable diseases as part of the state’s '100 Million Lives' campaign launched in October, the health minister has said.
In press statements, minister Hala Zayed said a total of 7,872, 224 citizens have been screened for the virus so far during the campaign’s second phase, which was launched on 30 November and includes Cairo, Beni Suef, Sohag, Menoufiya and Kafr El-Sheikh governorates.
The numbers from the second phase bring the total of those screened in the nation’s biggest ever anti-hepatitis C campaign to 20,567,418 people.
Zayed said the state aims to screen citizens likely to have the virus, and provide treatment free of charge.
According to 2015 statistics, 22 percent of the Egyptian population had hepatitis C.
Over the past three years, Egypt has been using a variety of new medications to combat the virus.
The health ministry has vowed to completely eliminate the disease from Egypt by 2022.
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