Egypt is free from Polio

... World Health Organization officials say, the birthplace of polio appears for the first time to have ceased to be a source of transmission of the virus, with no new cases recorded in Egypt over the past 12 months ...

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This is great news and I hope that we can keep it up. I hope that the keen detection of new cases and strict and wide spread immunization continues with the same level …

Egypt: HIV+

HIV

I have nothing new to say. Probably people reading this already know that the moral stigma of HIV is getting more people infected. The ignoramuses fearing that people would be promiscuous because of sex ed, are helping no one. Arguments against teaching teenagers about sex, drugs and condoms are no longer justified. I think more delays in introducing such classes will be a landmark failure in proper reasoning by the Egyptian society.

From the latest …

The network effect as a business model for ROC

First, some of you already know what is ROC. I wrote about it here. In a few words it is a volunteer driven undergraduate medical research course that aims to help medical students learn proper scientific research skills and qualify as research assistants.

As we are in desperate need for proper funding. I think we need to come up with a sort of "business model". Although we don't aim any profits. We aim to be …

A case of Female Genital Mutilation

On the day the tragic attacks on Sharm El-Sheikh, a different tragedy occurred and continues to occur but with a different magnitude. Although it affects the lives of more people than that of the bombings of Sinai, it however usually goes unreported. And mostly unseen.

Mona (name changed) a 10 year old girl was admitted with post-circumcision bleeding at around 2 a.m. that morning.

I was in the pre-labour room and a bed pushed …

ROC phase IIIa

Finished phase IIIa of the Research Orientation Course. It was a fascinating experience as usual. This time we had Shawky Galal, Youmna Tareef El-Kholy presenting and discussing with us Thomas Kuhn and Karl Popper's philosophy of science. In an earlier session we watched Ordinary Fascism by Mikhael Romm and discussed it with Mrs. Arab Lotfy. Those sessions made the course very special.

Other sessions were about scientific reasoning, data management, tabular and graphical presentation of …

No such hospital exists today in Cairo

The following is an excerpt from a series of lectures titled The Evolution of Modern Medicine delivered in 1913 by Sir Wiliam Osler. He is one of the founders of 20th century medicine and known to the masses by several Eponyms carrying his last name.

Unfortunately, his statement '''"No such hospital exists today in Cairo as that which was built by al-Mansur Gilafun in 1283"''' is still true today, which is based on an account …

The state of Fabraka

I found this editorial on SciDev about the state of science and research in Egypt. The first half of the article is a little bit optimistic but if you read on, this is probably one of the few articles that clearly outlines the obstacles facing science here. I took some notes and listed them:

  • Lack of funds (poor equipment and diminished journal subscriptions)
  • Low political priority
  • Academic quarrels
  • Research as a ladder for higher academic …

Phlebotomy

After almost a month in Pediatrics, I finally managed to break an important psychological barrier. I managed to draw blood from a 2 months old. I was mostly lucky, the boy had a single visible vein. Which I attacked like a hungry leopard. With no fear I poked the needle in it. When the blood started oozing from the needle it was a great relief, I felt self confidence running through my veins. No more …

Hepatitis C

Here are some depressing facts about Hepatitis C in Egypt.

The ultimate disregard for personal safety

Here, people don't give much thought about safety. Not even personal safety. People in many professions just don't care if they hurt themselves.

Rabak Youstor, they say. You can see workers in extremely dangerous situations not wearing anything to protect themselves. This is not only in case of blue collar workers. White collar workers too don't give a damn about the hazards of their job. Despite their higher education and knowledge about the risks. And …