Mehrdad Sharifi, deputy director of health at Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences, announced that air pollution in the past year has caused the deaths of 1,624 people in Khuzestan province.
On November 9, Sharifi said that in the past year, air pollution has inflicted more than 427 million dollars in damages to the health sector.
He added that in October alone, at least 22,000 people were hospitalized in Khuzestan due to air pollution.
The Research Center of Iran’s regime Majlis (parliament)had previously announced that in 2023, air pollution was responsible for the premature deaths of more than 30,000 people across 57 cities with a combined population of about 48 million.
In August 2025, Iranian media also reported that air pollution in the previous year had caused the deaths of 6,000 people in the capital, Tehran.
According to government officials, Isfahan province has the highest number of cancer and multiple sclerosis (MS) patients in the country, largely due to air pollution.
The air pollution situation in Khuzestan is extremely critical, with the air quality in several cities of the province often categorized as “purple” or even “brown”—the most hazardous levels—on many days of the year.
According to Sharifi, the air in the cities of Ahvaz, Dasht-e Azadegan, and Hoveyzeh has been classified as “healthy” for only two days over the past few months.
The Air Quality Index (AQI) is divided into six categories—“clean,” “acceptable,” “unhealthy for sensitive groups,” “unhealthy,” “very unhealthy,” and “hazardous”—with purple and brown representing the most dangerous levels for breathing.
This index is determined based on measurements of various air pollutants, including carbon monoxide, ozone, nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide, and particulate matter smaller than 2.5 microns.
With the continuation of air pollution in Khuzestan, all elementary and lower secondary schools in the province will remain closed until late November.
So far, several sources have been cited as contributors to Khuzestan’s air pollution, including industrial emissions, fires in the Iraqi part of the Hoor al-Azim wetland, burning of crop residues, rice and sugarcane cultivation, fires at old waste sites, and vehicle emissions.
However, air pollution is not limited to Khuzestan province; this crisis has affected citizens’ lives across other cities and provinces in Iran as well.
In recent years, air pollution levels in Iran have repeatedly reached critical thresholds, while frequent dust storms have further exacerbated environmental crises and public health threats.
Despite the growing severity of the problem, Iran’s regime has so far failed to introduce any coherent or sustainable plan to control or manage this crisis.
