CAIRO, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Egypt's National Cancer Institute (NCI) will conduct an investigation after the discovery of 17 COVID-19 cases among doctors and nurses, said a spokesman of Cairo University that runs the institute in a statement on Saturday.
"Cairo University has decided to suspend work at the institute only for one day on Saturday, taking into consideration the conditions of the cancer patients," said Mahmoud Alam-Eddin, Cairo University's official spokesman.
He stressed that the NCI will be completely sterilized on a daily basis from Saturday.
The university will open investigation to punish those responsible in case of negligence, Alam-Eddin added, noting that the university decided to hire two new teams for infection control over the issue.
"Since the very beginning of the crisis, the NCI has informed the Health Ministry's central laboratories to test the suspected infections of the novel coronavirus and quarantine those proved infected and those they contacted with," he pointed out.
Until Friday night, Egypt has confirmed 985 COVID-19 cases, including 66 deaths and 216 recoveries.
Egypt started on March 25 a two-week partial curfew from early evening to early morning as a key part of the country's precautionary measures to curb the spread of the highly infectious virus.
The novel coronavirus has so far infected over a million people and killed more than 59,000 worldwide.
