The President of the University participates in the second meeting of the Board of Directors of the National Reference Genome Project for Egyptians and Ancient Egyptians

Dr. Khaled Abdel Ghaffar, Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research, Acting Minister of Health and Population and Chairman of the Egyptian Genome Reference Council, chaired the second meeting of the Egyptian National Genome Project Council, in the presence of Dr. Mahmoud Sakr, President of the Academy of Scientific Research and Technology and Vice-Chairman of the Project Council, and Major General Dr. Khaled Amer, Director of the Medical Research and Regenerative Medicine Center and head of the research team, Dr. Mohamed Awad Taj El-Din, former Minister of Health, and Adviser to the President of the Republic for Preventive Health, Sir Dr. Magdy Yacoub, President of Magdy Yacoub Heart Foundation, and Dr. Mahmoud El-Metini, President of Ain Shams University, Prof. Ashraf Abdel Baset, President of Mansoura University, Prof. Mohamed Hashem, head of the National Research Center, and Dr. Yasser Refaat, Deputy Minister for Scientific Research Affairs, and the Vice President of Alexandria University on behalf of Dr. Abdulaziz Qanswa, President of Alexandria University, and Dr. Yehia Gad, Professor of Medical Molecular Genetics at the National Research Center and elected head of the scientific committee of the project, Dr. Gina El-Feki, supervisor of the scientific and cultural relations sector at the academy, deputy head of the scientific committee of the project, representatives of National Security, and the Ministry of Antiquities at the headquarters of the Academy of Scientific Research and Technology, also attended the meeting. Via video conferencing technology from the United States of America, and the Egyptian Scientist Dr. Hisham Al-Sadik, a professor at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas.

At the beginning of the meeting, the minister confirmed that since the President of the Republic launched the genome project on March 1, 2021, the infrastructure has been started to implement this project, noting that all the formed scientific committees meet periodically to take the necessary measures to start the necessary executive steps, praising the efforts made. On the part of the members of the scientific committees of the project, referring to the assignment of the President of the Republic to shorten the project’s time while providing the necessary funding for that. Dr. confirmed. Abdel Ghaffar said that this project will help predict future epidemic diseases and identify ways to confront them, and will help in the early detection of genes related to the most common diseases in Egyptians and the best therapeutic and preventive protocols for them. The results of the project will enable the Egyptian health system to benefit from medical advances in the field of personalized and accurate medicine.

The Minister also praised the efforts of the Medical Research and Regenerative Medicine Center at the Ministry of Defense in accomplishing the project’s tasks according to plan in cooperation with universities and research centers. For his part, Dr. Mohamed Awad Taj El-Din, the former Minister of Health and Advisor to the President for Health and Prevention, praised the importance of the project and the support given by the political leadership to the health system.

He stressed the need to shorten the project's time in light of the assignments of the President of the Republic, pointing to the need for concerted efforts from all state institutions to provide means of success for this national program.

Dr. Mahmoud Sakr presented a consolidated report on the project, reviewing the recommendations made by the First Genome Council, pointing to the completion of the development of an organizational structure for the project, the development of partnership models between the Academy, the Medical Research Center and the project’s member entities, as well as providing the necessary funding from the Academy and including the project within the Academy’s budget. Contract procedures have been completed with The Medical Research and Regenerative Medicine Center at the Ministry of Defense is considered a national project, and mechanisms have been developed to follow up the implementation of the project, explaining the full cooperation of the ministries and entities participating in the project.

Sakr added that what happened during the past ten months of the project's life is great, and it took other countries for years to complete it, and he thanked the main researcher of the project, Dr. Khaled Amer, the research team and the scientific committee, which made great efforts to develop scientific and operational plans in accordance with international standards.

For his part, Sir Magdy Yacoub stressed the need to benefit from the available expertise, experiences and information, and to build on what is already in place to implement the genome project. His Excellency expressed his happiness that the Egyptian state will adopt such a great national scientific project, and that the results of the project will benefit the health of Egyptians, as there are differences in the cure rates for different medicines based on the genetic makeup of the patient and they differ from one society to another.

On his part, Dr. Khaled Amer, reviewed the executive steps of the project and the latest developments in the genome project to date, pointing to cooperation with the Academy of Scientific Research to implement a number of supporting projects, the most important of which is the project’s information infrastructure project.

Dr. Khaled said that the establishment, equipment and operation of the project's genome research center at the headquarters of the Medical Research and Regenerative Medicine Center at the Ministry of Defense has been completed, and researchers have been trained on the devices, and the genetic sequence study for the first group of Egyptians will be completed by May 2022.

His Excellency also referred to assigning the President of the Republic to start preparing a propaganda campaign to encourage citizens to volunteer DNA samples for the project.

Dr. Yahya Gad praised the efforts made by the formed scientific committee during the last period since the launch of the project, where 14 meetings of the scientific committee were held, in addition to preparing a proposal for the project’s executive regulations, noting that the project’s implementation plan was divided into three categories: the population genome category and the Genome of the ancient Egyptians, and the category of disease groups.

Also Dr. Gina Elfeki, reviewed the participation of the genome project in the Dubai Expo in February 2022 with the aim of promoting the national project for the reference genome for Egyptians, inviting Egyptian scientists specializing in the diaspora to participate, and calling for the establishment of an Arab regional alliance in human genomics.

At the end of the meeting, the council directed the expeditious completion of the project’s scientific committee within 6 weeks of defining the tasks and those responsible for each task and the necessary cost for that in relation to the categories of diseased groups. The council also agreed to include the Egyptian Knowledge Bank among the entities participating in the project.

It is worth noting that the reference genome project for Egyptians and ancient Egyptians is the largest research project in the history of the modern Egyptian scientific research system. The Medical Research and Regenerative Medicine Center at the Ministry of Defense, which includes 13 universities and research centers from the Ministries of Defense, Higher Education, Scientific Research, Health and Communications, and a number of civil society institutions.

President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, President of the Republic, on March 1, 2021 gave the start signal for the project, considering it a national project with funding of one billion pounds as a first phase over 5 years ending in 2025, and the contract was signed in March 2021 and the actual implementation began. The project aims to study the genes of Egyptians and ancient Egyptians; With the aim of providing personalized and accurate medicine services, anticipating diseases and providing medical services according to the latest scientific findings.