Nineteen people have died and 30 have been injured in an explosion outside Egypt's National Cancer Institute in central Cairo, Egypt's health ministry said early on Monday.
A car driving against traffic on Cairo's corniche near the famed Tahrir Square collided with up to three vehicles, causing the explosion, Egypt's interior ministry said in a statement.
The blast caused a fire in the hospital, where at least 54 patients were evacuated to other hospitals. The fire was later brought under control, with television footage Monday morning showing shattered windows and doors. The health ministry did not say if hospital patients or staff were among the casualties.
Why the crash caused such a large explosion wasn't immediately clear.
Egypt's public prosecutor is investigating the cause of the incident, sources told Reuters, but there was no official statement indicating that the explosion was an attack.
"We heard an explosion and ... the bank entrance glass was shattered everywhere," said Abdel-Rahman Mohamed, a security officer at a bank at the opposite side of the hospital.
The health ministry said the injured people were taken to hospitals for treatment.
