I have to claim absence from real blogging over the past month on health matters. Nothing serious, but enough that in four weeks I’ve been on antibiotics (with due cause, not just because I’ve had a sniffle – if you’ve been to the average Egyptian doctor you’ll know what I mean) three times in the past four weeks….

A few days ago I arrived at the doctor’s with Mr S. It was about 30C outside (8pm) and everyone was wearing summer clothes. The doctor walked into the clinic, came over and said hello to us (we’re permanent fixtures there this month). Then his head jerked back to me, looked at me wrapped up in a fleece and asked with mor concern that doctors usually express what was wrong. Mr S said, “She has a temperature of 39.3C (108F). ” I looked up from snuggling my neck into the hood of my fleece and said, “I’m cold”.

Action stations hit red alert. Assistants were summoned with the sort of urgency that says ‘I’m calm, I’m keeping calm, but move NOW!’ to open a room for me and put me in..well, an informal, temporary quarantine. I was happy: – it had a bed and it was too much effort for me to sit up, so I could just sleep as I waited for my turn. I was sure it wasn’t Swine Flu, but at the same time, was really hoping it wasn’t – I had no desire to be in the hospital where they keep those with swine flu, 5 star service it isn’t…

It came quickly. He took my temperature, and it had risen again. I told him I felt like I had flu and food poisoning at the same time, because my knees were so sore. Then the questions about chest pain, coughing, sore throat came. I answered no to them. Then he did an abdominal exam and found a source of pain.

Then he asked if I’d eaten outside the house over the weekend. Mr S and I looked at each other sheepishly, and I left Mr S to answer, “Yes…foul and ta’ameya..in Ras Sudr”. Ras Sudr, being a small town on the Western Sinai coast, is rather like saying that we ate from the street in Cairo – the chances of food there being really clean are slim. Then he had to add the cardinal sin, “Oh, and we asked for salad in the sandwiches.”

The laughter that came out of the normally serious doctor was nothing short of a giant wave of relief. “It’s just a case of bad food poisoning!” he eventually bellowed through his chortles, “Don’t worry, it’s not Swine Flu.”.

Something along the lines of, “Well of course not, all the pigs are dead” zipped through my mind, but I held my tongue – it was too much effort to move it anyway.

After I told this story to a friend yesterday, she replied that everyone is over reacting about swine flu. I have to say, I think he’s over reacting because it was food poisoning, but if I had had swine flu, it would have been sensible. I’d rather be put in a separate room unnecessarily, than not!

I’ve been at home pretty much for the past month so I haven’t had much contact with people. I have been told though, by a normally sensible person, that we should all be eating red fruit and veg. Why? Because apparently an Egyptian doctor has been in the press saying that that would protect against swine flu. Right. “Does this doctor also own a farm? Fruit and veg shops?” I asked.

It seems I’m not the only cynic. 

First published in Daily News Egypt on 14 June 2009

*from the strip: bool means urine in Arabic.