Sisi orders reduction in coronavirus tests among policemen, detainees

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi has ordered a reduction in coronavirus tests among policemen and detainees after reducing tests available to paramedics, sources told Arabi21 yesterday.

The sources also said that the presidential order included directives to force those found to have contracted the disease into quarantine at home and not at hospital.

According to the sources, the infection is spreading among police officers, “but there is a blackout on the real numbers in order not to arouse horror among Interior Ministry employees, fearing this would negatively affect its services.”

Senior police officers reported that many coronavirus patients reach hospitals only to be turned away and forced to quarantine at home.

One senior police officer told Arabi21 that three senior officers working with him, a junior officer and an “unrecognised number” of people he knows were infected and then mixed with a large number of other people and officers.

These patients, according to the senior officer, were given pain killers and advised to remain at home.

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