We all remember the outbreak of the mad cow disease in Europe and the extensive media coverage and warnings that accompanied the discovery of the disease. Then came SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome), which caused panic across Asia and the rest of the world. The media, doctors and experts were quick to advise people on how to avoid infection while at home, in a market shopping, at an airport waiting for a flight or in a hospital visiting a patient.

There is nothing wrong or shameful in people falling sick. What is indeed wrong and shameful is for officials to try to hide the truth from the public or deny the disease ever existed — as is happening now in the province of Jizan in the southern part of the Kingdom. An outbreak of Malta Fever in the region caused people to sicken and animals to die.

However, the director general of agriculture in the region, Abdullah Al-Musfir, and his deputy Hassan Ayoub as well as the director general of health affairs, Dr. Ali Al-Qahtani, all denied the disease was wreaking havoc in their area.

What is even stranger is for the deputy minister of health for preventive medicine, Dr. Yakub Al-Mazroui, to issue a statement from his office in Riyadh saying the health situation in Jizan was satisfactory, denying any animals died and assuring us the local population have been enlightened on the situation. When and how people were enlightened is anybody’s guess.

For those officials who deny because they are used to simplifying matters, there is no problem if just five heads of cattle — more or less — died of a disease. Some would even tell you: The number is insignificant, why blow up and exaggerate things?

Those officials and the ministers they work under should recall what happened a few years ago when the Rift Valley Fever hit Jizan. The outbreak of the disease prompted Crown Prince Abdullah to fly directly into the region from outside the Kingdom where he was on a foreign trip in order to see for himself, examine the deteriorating situation and visit patients in hospitals.

I don’t want to remind those officials and the ministers of a situation I assume they have never forgotten. But I would say to them that after reading media reports and seeing the pictures of the situation in Jizan, I realized why those officials kept denying. They did so not because the matter is simple but because they don’t know what was happening in that part of the country. They sought to cover up their ignorance of the situation by issuing denials.

Jizan is a remote and rugged mountainous place and very difficult to reach and for this reason I suggest the three ministers should file a complaint against the Ministry of Transport and leave the people and animals in Jizan to suffer while they wait for a verdict.