Christian hospital serves Muslim neighbours in Egypt

A hospital in Egypt is challenging the inter-faith friction which has seen the country's Christians pitted against Muslims in sectarian disputes.

Around 10 per cent of Egypt’s population are Coptic Christians, while the other 90 per cent are almost all Muslim. Tensions between the two communities often flare up in the form of attacks, riots and occasional killings.

However, one hospital run by the Anglican Diocese of North Africa is changing that. The Christian-run Harpur Memorial Hospital is serving the local Muslim population in the Nile Delta town of Menouf, reports Voice of America.

Unusually for a hospital, Harpur receives no funding from the government. Despite this, and the religious differences, people come from all over the region to be treated at the hospital owing to its good reputation.

Samir Bakheet, the gynaecologist who runs the hospital, said, "All the people here, most of them, are Muslim but they prefer to come here because they trust the hospital," reports Voice of America.

Dr Michael Awad, an anaesthesiologist who quit a high paid job in Cairo to join the hospital, spoke of the Irish doctor Frank Harpur, who founded the hospital 100 years ago and is known for eradicating a parasite which was ravaging the countryside.

"He used to come from Cario using a houseboat, travelling down the branches of the Nile and then getting off shore to go see the patients and then going back to Cairo," said Dr Awad said.

"Enclostama is a small worm that feeds on the blood of the patients … And he [Harpur] introduced this newly discovered medicine and it helped them. So they regained health, regained power, and went back to their villages."

The Anglican bishop who oversees the hospital, Mouneer Anis, said that doctors at the hospital were able to show Christian compassion to their Muslim neighbours.

"In a way it gives us opportunity for us as Christians to serve our neighbour, the Muslims here … And to love them, real love, genuine love. Not just a love with hidden agendas. But a real love."