Egypt's Interior Ministry launches campaign to vaccinate prisoners against COVID-19

CAIRO - 18 May 2020: Egypt's Interior Ministry has launched a campaign to vaccinate inmates in all prisons across Egypt who will receive Covid shots in a bid to maximize health care services inside jails.

The move follows directives by Interior Minister Mahmoud Tawfiq, said his assistant for prison affairs Tareq Marzouq in statements to MENA Tuesday.

Speaking on the fringe of a visit by a humanitarian delegation to Fayyoum Prison, Marzouq touched upon a plan to inoculate inmates, noting the first jabs will be given to elderly prisoners and those suffering from chronic diseases.

Thanks to strict precautionary measures, no coronavirus cases have so far been detected in any of Egypt’s prisons, he assured.

1,188 new coronavirus cases were detected in Egypt, upping the total number of confirmed cases since the outbreak in the country began to 246,909.

In a statement, Spokesman for the Health Ministry Khaled Megahed said 61 patients have died from the virus over the past 24 hours, raising the death toll to 14,388.

As many as 546 patients were discharged from isolation hospitals after receiving necessary medical care, taking the number of recovered cases to 182,024 so far, the spokesman said.