Pestilence in Egypt

A Government doctor in the little village of Al Korein, north of Cairo, reported some patients with vomiting, cramps and diarrhea. Four days later, ancient, crowded Egypt knew that it had an outbreak of Asiatic choler, the first since 1902, when cholera swept all Egypt, killing 34,595 people (mortality: 85%). Eventually the 1902 outbreak reached Europe and America.

Quick Action. There was virtually no treatment for cholera 45 years ago, little public health cooperation. But last week a vast machine, reaching from Russia to the U.S., was in efficient action. Troops sealed off the infected areas; cinemas were closed; new water wells were dug. Two thousand doctors began the slow and dangerous task of mopping up the disease.

On Sept. 29,.. a U.S. Navy-chartered DC-4 flew in from the U.S. with enough anti-cholera vaccine for 200,000 people. Within two days, four more planes arrived, hightailing straight across the Atlantic. The U.N.'s World Health Organization rushed vaccine to nervous countries near Egypt. Planes came from Britain, France, Switzerland, Iraq. China (where cholera is endemic but out of season) sent a million units of vaccine. A Russian plane was expected this week with another million.

Modern Treatment. Cholera, an infection of the digestive tract, kills chiefly by removing water from the body. The blood gets too thick to circulate, and death comes from "shock." Modern treatment knocks off the vibrios (comma-shaped, whiskery bacteria) with sulfa drugs, and dilutes the thickening blood with saline solution or serum. The vaccine has worked well. No one receiving two injections (cost: 3-c-) has yet got the disease; only one who has had a single shot has come down with it.

Egypt's authorities know that neither quarantine nor immunization nor individual cures can fully protect her crowded population. So they are going after the flies, busy spreaders of cholera, which swarm over Egypt in uncountable billions, as they did in the time of Moses. U.S. Pilot Bob Holt, hired by the Egyptian Government for antimalaria spraying, covers Cario daily with a fog of DDT. The flies of Egypt are specially tough, but the DDT is getting them down.

The health authorities are not yet in a mood to cheer. Egypt's people, many living in squalid surroundings, undernourished and with no built-up resistance to cholera, may still get it. Wandering Bedouin may still carry the disease to neighboring countries. But except for a few scattered and well-watched cases outside the main area, by this week the epidemic seemed pretty well fenced in. Since the start, there have been only 1,050 proved cases, 674 deaths. Help is still arriving.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.