According to the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), the Covid-19 crisis in Iran has reached a critical point and is continuing to worsen day by day. The People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) reported that as of Sunday, August 15, the Covid-19 death toll in Iran has surpassed 364,400.
According to the official Iran daily, as reported on August 12, Iran ranked first in the world in terms of the number of new cases of Covid with more than 42,000 patients testing positive, and they were second in the world in terms of the number of deaths. Further reports suggest that medical centers across 31 provinces of Iran are currently treating patients infected with delta strain of coronavirus.
Setar-e Sobh, a state-run daily, reported on August 14 that, “Although coronavirus entered the country in January 2020 due to Mahan Airlines flights to China, authorities officially announced its existence in the last days of February 2020. If we review the authorities’ actions from that day until now, we will find that at first, they not only did not take the danger of the coronavirus seriously but also sought to normalize it.”
At the beginning of the pandemic, the NCRI revealed documents obtained from the National Emergency Organization which show that “By late January, several infected individuals were identified in Tehran and the regime had allocated certain hospitals such as Massih Daneshvar, Yaftabad, and Khomeini to deal with these patients. The authorities tried their utmost to prevent any information about these cases from leaking.”
The Iranian regime has repeatedly claimed that a domestic vaccine will be mass-produced by February 2021, and any surplus vaccines will be exported abroad.
In the state-run Sharq daily, it was reported on August 14 that, “We cried for quarantining the city, and now there is not even an empty hospital bed in this mourning city. Now everything from IV fluids to coffins and ambulances is scarce. Hundreds of families lose their loved ones due to the negligence of the authorities every day, and our question is how many people have to die, how many families have to mourn so that those ‘officials’ come to their senses?”
They also reported that the medical staff in the hospitals of Iran, are worn out and many who have written resignations, have had their requests denied due to the lack of staff available.
The regime’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, reportedly banned vaccines in early 2021, with official figures amounting to 23 million doses being banned from entering the country by late March. An action that resulted in thousands of deaths in the country. Initially, regime officials refused to announce a nationwide lockdown. When a lockdown was then announced, they refused to financially support the Iranian people, forcing them back to work.
The NCRI said, “Khamenei and his regime used the Covid-19 to control Iran’s restive society, following the major protests in November 2019 that threatened the regime’s existence. Now the situation is out of the regime’s control, and soon, it will see the consequences of sending people to the Covid-19 minefields.”
