According to the spokesperson of Iran’s Ministry of Health, the latest reports on Iran’s COVID-19 outbreak indicate 43 infections and eight fatalities.
But according to local reports, the numbers are much higher. It is impossible to confirm all the reports coming from Iran but because the Iranian regime has a long history of hiding the facts, we have included local reports of Iran’s COVID-19 outbreak.
LOCAL REPORTS
Rasht, northern Iran – “My brother has been hospitalized in a hospital in Rasht for the past 10 days. Since last night, no doctors have visited the patients in the infectious ward of Qaem Hospital. The research doctor and Dr. Reza Zadeh are both hospitalized, and no other doctors are willing to visit the patients because they are afraid of the lack of facilities. All the hospital staff are terrified.”
Rasht, northern Iran – Message from medical interns: “The conditions are horrid. They won’t even give us masks and they send us to tend to patients with COVID-19. Many of the staff are now suffering from flu like symptoms.”
Gilan, northern Iran – Message from a medical intern: “As interns in Gilan, we said that we would not go to hospitals without equipment, masks and special clothes, and our professors, who are at home, threaten to fire us.”
Rasht, northern Iran – On Saturday, Kobra Hassanzadeh, 40, passed away in Qaem Hospital in Rasht from COVID-19. There are also reports that around 50 people including the head of the hospital and three doctors have been infected in Razi Hospital in Rasht.
Shiraz, southwestern Iran – Message from a doctor: “In Faghihi Hospital, we have three cases of the COVID-19, and they were transferred to Ali Asghar Hospital. In Peivand Hospital, several other people who have COVID-19 symptoms have been hospitalized for more testing.”
Tehran – “I’m a surgical assistant at Loghman Hospital in Tehran. A 57-year-old man passed away today in Loghman. His symptoms and CT scan showed that he had COVID-19. The COVID-19 tests results have not come in yet. The patient was a tailor without prior illnesses. An assistant optician at Imam Hossein Hospital has tested positive for COVID-19 and has been hospitalized. The rest of his colleagues are working as usual and no one has been quarantined. Both me and my spouse have flu like symptoms and it’s not clear whether we’ve been infected or not but there’s a high probability of infection.”
The principal of a Tehran school – “They announced last night that schools would be closed for two days for disinfection and precautionary measures. I called the Department of Education today to ask them to allocate manpower and disinfectants for our school. They said they did not have the manpower or the budget to buy disinfectants. This is all just propaganda and a farce!”
OFFICIAL REPORTS
Kiyanoush Jahanpour, a health ministry spokesperson, said on Sunday that 15 new cases of the COVID-19 infection had been confirmed. Seven new cases were reported in Qom, four in Tehran, two in the northern province of Gilan, one in the central province of Markazi, and one in the northern province of Mazandaran, the state-run IRNA news agency reported.
Iranian authorities ordered the closure of schools, universities and other educational centers in 14 provinces across the country from Sunday, according to state television.
They include Qom, Markazi, Gilan, Ardabil, Kermanshah, Qazvin, Zanjan, Mazandaran, Golestan, Hamedan, Alborz, Semnan, Kurdistan and the capital, Tehran.
Iranian MP, Bahram Parsaie: “The fact that domestic airlines’ are only thinking about profits and also the fact that (officials) did not take the warning of the World Health Organization seriously, has led to the spread of COVID-19 in Iran. The number of fatalities in Iran is the highest in the world after china.”
Yesterday a regime affiliated expert, Mostafa Eghlima blamed Iran’s COVID-19 outbreak on the regime in an article in the state-run Jahan-e San’at News daily.
State-run Jahan-e San’at News daily, Feb. 22:
“When a crisis arises in a country, the most important issue is timely awareness. An example of this was in China. The Chinese government ignored the doctor who first announced the outbreak and when they officially announced it, it was too late. But China is powerful and experienced and quickly quarantined a city with a 5 million population and built a special hospital in just six days…
For the past two or three weeks, Chinese tourists have been traveling to Iran. The Ministry of Health announced that authorities are deploying digital Thermometer at airports to monitor passengers’ condition and that there was no cause for concern.
Whenever the subject came up, the Ministry of Health stressed that the virus had still not reached Iran. This is while everyone knew that the symptoms took around two weeks to show up. So they should not have been so adamant in stressing that (COVID-19 had not reached the country).
On Wednesday, February 19, they announced that four days ago, two people died in Qom as a result of coronavirus. Imagine how shocked the people were to hear the death of two people overnight.
Currently, people are terrified, and they fear that when two people are announced dead, 100 people have been infected. But the Ministry of Health refuses to announce the numbers. Also, since they failed to quarantine Qom as they announced the deaths, Qom residents took refuge in neighboring cities. This means that those who were infected unknowingly spread the virus to other cities…
No one trusts the Iranian government. The Ministry of Health is afraid to announce the exact numbers and this lie will widen the gap between the government and the people. Timely and accurate statistics will be a source of comfort to the people, but officials continue to insist on their lies. They have only told the public to follow basic personal hygiene habits, but are they providing enough awareness for the people?
The whole country is terrified of getting the virus, because no matter how much they observe personal hygiene, where should they go if they get infected? Are we aware that we have only 50 test kits for this virus? We should have bought it beforehand, but none of the officials care about the people.
Interestingly, the Health Minister on Tuesday firmly stated that ‘we have no cases of COVID-19!’ So how come two people die from the virus in the span of just two days? Why shouldn’t people be scared? They are confused because no one in the country will be held accountable.
We do not have a well-equipped hospital to treat patients. They transport patients from all over the country and bring them to Tehran for treatment. Hospital doctors are terrified of visiting patients because they do not know what to do. Why have two doctors died since last night? Because we don’t have isolation equipment.
90% of the people do not trust the government.
Why is there so little trust in an Iranian family today? Because of the government’s lack of transparency, the country is virtually disabled. Everyone wants to flee Iran in any way they can. At the time of the virus outbreak, we did not suspend our flights to any country and we even increased them to China. But during these three days, all countries cancelled their flights to and from Iran. We let in Chinese tourists and students to Iran as if nothing has happened. This only shows how irresponsible and incompetent officials are and, unfortunately, no organization holds them accountable. If these people were in charge in another country, they would have been executed for their mistakes.”
