The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared Egypt malaria-free, a development that the UN public health organization has praised as “truly historic.”
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus stated, “Malaria is as old as Egyptian civilization itself, but the disease that plagued pharaohs now belongs to its history.”
The first attempts to eradicate the fatal infectious disease spread by mosquitoes in almost a century were made by Egyptian officials.
When a nation demonstrates that the transmission chain has been disrupted for at least the preceding three years, certification is given. At least 600,000 people die from malaria each year, almost all of them in Africa.
The WHO commended “the Egyptian government and people” in a statement released on Sunday for their efforts to “end a disease that has been present in the country since ancient times.”
According to the statement, Egypt joined the United Arab Emirates and Morocco as the third nation in the WHO’s Eastern Mediterranean region to receive certification.
44 nations and one territory have accomplished this feat worldwide.
However, the WHO cautioned Egypt to be vigilant in order to maintain its status as a country free of malaria, saying the accreditation was simply “the beginning of a new phase.”
A nation must prove its ability to stop the spread of the disease in order to receive WHO accreditation.
