Egyptian people. In a report by the German Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau
(1986: 109), which finances rehabilitation projects carried out since the con-
struction of the Aswan High Dam, it is stated as a positive development that
between 1955 and 1976 the infection rate of people living in the Nile delta
fell from 31 per cent to 27 per cent. The authors seem to have overlooked
the fact that during the same time the percentage of those living under the
risk of contracting the disease decreased much more owing to the rapid ur-
banization process that took place in the country. At the same time hygiene
in Egyptian villages and the supply of clean drinking water improved greatly,
so the percentage of people suffering from bilharzia should have decreased
much more significantly. A decrease in the number of people affected of
only 4 per cent must be considered a failure in combating the disease. Ac-
cording to the daily paper Al-Wafd the rate of infection in Egypt in 1999 was
still 20 per cent (Al-Wafd, 11 April 1999: 6). Moreover, most statistics do not
show that there are two different types of bilharzia, namely the less serious
form affecting the bladder and the mostly fatal one affecting the intestines
and eventually destroying the liver. Today this latter, dangerous type is on
the increase (Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau 1986: 106). In Upper Egypt this
type of bilharzia was completely unknown until the construction of the High
Dam. The snail hosting the worm that causes the disease was able to migrate
upstream only after the seasonal Nile swell with its torrential flood ceased
to take place.