On Wednesday, three Egyptian cargo military planes, loaded with medical supplies, took from East Air Base to Tunisia to support its health sector’s efforts to face the coronavirus pandemic.
The medical aid comes in accordance with President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi’s directives highlighting the depth and interdependence of relations between the two countries.
After its successful campaign against the pandemic last year, Tunisia’s health system is currently collapsing due to a hike in the number of daily coronavirus infections and deaths, as well as the severe shortage of oxygen supplies.
On Friday, the north African country recorded 189 deaths, the highest daily toll since the pandemic began last year, and 8,500 new coronavirus cases, raising its tally of infections to 480,000 with more than 16,000 deaths.
Egypt’s shipment of the medical aid will arrive in Tunisia on board two military planes in coordination with the Egyptian Armed Forces, Health Ministry Spokesperson Khaled Megahed said in the statement.
According to Megahed, the items included in the shipment are 1,500 doses of the Remdesivir drug to treat coronavirus patients, 300 medical oxygen cylinders and the same number of regulators, 100 pulse oximeter devices, 40 monitors, 10 high-flow nasal oxygen generators, 200,000 surgical masks, 20,000 high-efficiency masks in addition to 20,000 latex glove boxes.
Megahed stressed the importance of maintaining the air bridge between the two countries to transfer medical aid from Egypt to meet the needs of Tunisia’s health system.
So far, according to Reuters, only 715,000 Tunisians have received two doses of vaccine out of a total of 11.6 million residents.
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