Kefaya – An Egyptian Movement for Change

KEFAYA is a word Egyptians might get accustomed to in the coming period. Everyone agrees that Reform is desirable and necessary, yet almost everyone disagrees about what should be reformed and how reform should occur. This paper deals more with domestic calls for reform, focusing on Gamal Mubarak as the bet of the Egyptian government and the Egyptian Movement for Change – a.k.a. KEFAYA - as the representative of other reform-seekers. Through comparing them both, the paper will assess which party intends or has better chances of achieving desired levels of reform

QCD thermodynamics and magnetization in nonzero magnetic field

In nonzero magnetic field, the magnetic properties and thermodynamics of the quantum-chromodynamic (QCD) matter is studied in the hadron resonance gas and the Polyakov linear-sigma models and compared with recent lattice calculations. Both models are fairly suited to describe the degrees of freedom in the hadronic phase. The partonic ones are only accessible by the second model. It is found that the QCD matter has paramagnetic properties, which monotonically depend on the temperature and are not affected by the hadron-quark phase-transition. Furthermore, raising the magnetic field strength increases the thermodynamic quantities, especially in the hadronic phase but reduces the critical temperature, i.e. inverse magnetic catalysis.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figures accepted for publication in AHE

Policies to Protect Healthcare Providers in Public Hospitals in Egypt Amid the First Wave Covid-19 Crisis: A Case Study

The emergence of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic in 2020 became a main public health problem among the worlds. Universally, healthcare workers were forced to face an unprecedented challenge since the outbreak COVID-19. The World Health Organization (WHO) has been trying to reduce transmission of COVID-19 between different countries by setting regulations and standards in attempt to control the transmission of infection. The protection of healthcare workers working as frontline workers for COVID-19 is a priority. To assess the occupational workplace policies to protect healthcare workers in public university hospitals in Egypt during the first wave of COVID-19, this research was conducted at a major public university hospital. These policies were crucial to protect the frontline workers from COVID-19 infection amid the first wave of COVID-19. In depth interviews were conducted to gather information about the current policies in the case study hospital. Results of this research are vital to all public hospitals which provide service a large segment of the population in Egypt. Defective implementation of the workplace policies, lack of needed managerial support, and poor communication between the administration and the healthcare workers were highlighted. The challenge of substandard infrastructure and insufficient resources in the healthcare system during the pandemic at the case study contributed to the crisis. Additionally, the absence of psychological and mental health support needed to health care workers amid the ongoing stress of COVID-19 with all the mental challenges they are facing. The findings of this research give insights to the protective workplace policies of COVID-19 for healthcare workers at the case study public hospitals and challenges in their application and different policy alternatives

Population-based rapid assessment of avoidable blindness survey in Sohag governorate in Egypt.

OBJECTIVES: To determine the prevalence and causes of blindness and vision impairment, and the coverage and quality of cataract surgical services, among population aged 50 years and older in Sohag governorate in Egypt. DESIGN: A population-based cross-sectional survey using two-stage cluster random sampling following the rapid assessment of avoidable blindness methodology. SETTING: A community-based survey conducted by six teams of ophthalmologists, assistants and local guides. Enrolment and examination were door-to-door in selected clusters. PARTICIPANTS: Using 2016 census data, 68 population units were randomly selected as clusters (of 60 people) with probability proportionate to population size. Anyone aged 50 years and older, residing in a non-institutional setting in a cluster for at least 6 months, was eligible to participate. PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES: The prevalence and causes of blindness and vision impairment. Secondary outcomes were CSC and effectiveness and participant-reported barriers to cataract surgery. RESULTS: Of 4078 participants enrolled, 4033 (98.9%) were examined. The age-adjusted and sex-adjusted prevalence of blindness, severe vision impairment and moderate vision impairment were 5.9% (95% CI 4.8% to 6.9%), 4.7% (95% CI 3.8% to 5.7%) and 18.9% (95% CI 16.8% to 21.0%), respectively. Cataract caused most of blindness (41.6%), followed by non-trachomatous corneal opacity (15.7%) and posterior segment diseases (14.5%). Cataract surgical coverage (CSC) for persons for visual acuity <3/60 was 86.8%, the proportion of cataract surgeries with poor visual outcome was 29.5% and effective CSC (eCSC) was 44.9%. eCSC was lower in women than men. The most frequently reported barrier to surgery was cost (51.5%). CONCLUSIONS: The prevalence of blindness in Sohag governorate is higher than districts in other middle-income countries in the region. CSC was high; however, women suffer worse quality-corrected CSC than men. The quality of cataract surgery needs to be addressed, while health system strengthening across government and private settings could alleviate financial barriers

Protective Efficacy of Centralized and Polyvalent Envelope Immunogens in an Attenuated Equine Lentivirus Vaccine

Lentiviral Envelope (Env) antigenic variation and related immune evasion present major hurdles to effective vaccine development. Centralized Env immunogens that minimize the genetic distance between vaccine proteins and circulating viral isolates are an area of increasing study in HIV vaccinology. To date, the efficacy of centralized immunogens has not been evaluated in the context of an animal model that could provide both immunogenicity and protective efficacy data. We previously reported on a live-attenuated (attenuated) equine infectious anemia (EIAV) virus vaccine, which provides 100% protection from disease after virulent, homologous, virus challenge. Further, protective efficacy demonstrated a significant, inverse, linear relationship between EIAV Env divergence and protection from disease when vaccinates were challenged with viral strains of increasing Env divergence from the vaccine strain Env. Here, we sought to comprehensively examine the protective efficacy of centralized immunogens in our attenuated vaccine platform. We developed, constructed, and extensively tested a consensus Env, which in a virulent proviral backbone generated a fully replication-competent pathogenic virus, and compared this consensus Env to an ancestral Env in our attenuated proviral backbone. A polyvalent attenuated vaccine was established for comparison to the centralized vaccines. Additionally, an engineered quasispecies challenge model was created for rigorous assessment of protective efficacy. Twenty-four EIAV-naïve animals were vaccinated and challenged along with six-control animals six months post-second inoculation. Pre-challenge data indicated the consensus Env was more broadly immunogenic than the Env of the other attenuated vaccines. However, challenge data demonstrated a significant increase in protective efficacy of the polyvalent vaccine. These findings reveal, for the first time, a consensus Env immunogen that generated a fully-functional, replication-competent lentivirus, which when experimentally evaluated, demonstrated broader immunogenicity that does not equate to higher protective efficacy