In a report on the intensification of the crackdown on protests in Iran, The Telegraph, a British daily newspaper, wrote that hospitals have been filled with bodies and injured people, and doctors report overflowing morgues, severe shortages of medical supplies, and security forces firing directly at protesters.
Bodies and wounded individuals arrive at hospitals continuously. Some are brought by ambulances with sirens blaring nonstop; others arrive piled atop one another in pickup trucks, drenched in blood. Still others are brought in private cars by terrified relatives who enter hospital grounds honking their horns and shouting for help.
This is the picture of medical facilities in Iran as reported by The Telegraph. This comes as many of the injured have not been transferred to hospitals due to security conditions, and their relatives are trying to treat them at home.
Mashhad, January 8, 2026: Iranian regime security forces fire at protesters#IranProt #FreeIran2026ests #IranRevolution pic.twitter.com/n9MYgT2LaX
— Iran Focus (@Iran_Focus) January 14, 2026
Reports have also emerged of bodies being kept in homes out of fear that they might be seized by regime forces and agents of repression.
According to The Telegraph, some of the injured were taken to hospitals on foot by their relatives; people who did not wait for transportation, instead carrying their loved ones in their arms or on their shoulders and running.
Men, women, and children …
Some are alive but struggling to breathe. Others died before reaching the hospital.
They have gunshot wounds, severe blows to the head, and faces shattered by pellets. Bodies so badly injured that doctors do not know where to begin.
Hospitals on the brink of collapse
The Telegraph’s account and report continue: Dawn brings new wounded. In the afternoons, even more arrive. At night, there is no calm at all. Nearly three weeks of nonstop protests have sent victims of the regime’s repression flooding into Iran’s hospitals at a pace the medical staff cannot handle.
Emergency wards are soaked in blood. Morgues have overflowed. Body bags have been moved into courtyards because there is no space left inside to store them.
Doctors inside Iran, speaking to the outside world through limited Starlink connections, describe a healthcare system on the brink of collapse. They report days of work without sleep, extreme exhaustion, and shortages of everything.
One doctor near Tehran says bodies and wounded people are being brought by trucks, ambulances, and private cars, and many have died because there was not even time to tend to them.
He says medical staff collapse from exhaustion and that “rivers of blood are flowing in hospitals.”
Evidence of widespread killing
According to The Telegraph, Iran’s regime has tried to conceal the scale of this massacre, but evidence sent from inside the country likely shows part of it.
Activists, eyewitnesses, and grieving families, despite serious risks, have managed to get documentation of the events out of Iran.
The Telegraph writes that the intensity of this crackdown has turned it into one of the bloodiest examples in recent history.
The outlet compares the January 2025 killings in Iran to the early years of the Syrian civil war or the massacre of student protesters during the suppression of China’s Tiananmen Square.
Direct fire and raids on hospitals
Eyewitnesses have said that Basij forces and security agents fired live ammunition at protesters and chased them into alleyways.
Reports also speak of the severe beating of injured protesters.
The Telegraph wrote that even hospitals are not safe and that security forces have raided medical centers to arrest the wounded and transfer bodies, an action that appears aimed at concealing evidence.
Iran’s regime has now abandoned any pretense of restraint. Witnesses report the presence of snipers on rooftops. The goal is no longer dispersing crowds but killing protesters.
The intensity of the repression is a sign of the regime’s fear. A regime deeply anxious about its future that has found bloody repression to be its only means of survival. However, experience shows that Iran’s regime faces difficult days ahead and appears unlikely to emerge safely from this predicament.
