Dr. Ghanei, a member of National Task Force, said the “2 million doses” of COVAX COVID-19 vaccines that Islamic Republic has purchased will be delivered in about 6 weeks (March 2021). He said they will be used to immunize the healthcare staff! However, Health Minister, FDA Spokesman and other officials had claimed Islamic Republic has paid for 16.8million doses from COVAX! The mysteries surrounding coronavirus vaccine in Iran seems to be never ending!
In the meantime, the first 3 volunteers who got the first dose of COVIran Barekat 2 weeks ago, received their second dose. According to officials, there has been no complications reported so far. This vaccine is supposed to be available for Iranians by July 2021! On the other hand, Cuban vaccine is supposed to start its third phase of clinical trial in Iran! It’s unclear whether US designation of the communist country as a sponsor of terrorists would hinder the collaboration. According to Islamic Republic, US sanctions have been the cause of delay in everything health related!
Nurses across the country have been struggling with extremely difficult working conditions throughout the epidemic with unpaid wages and benefits, long exhausting shifts and no job security! As usual, nothing has been done for them other than empty promises from Khamenei and other kleptocrats in the regime. Today was Milad Hospital’s nursing staff turn to show their frustration and protest:
Even the daily manipulated data of Islamic Republic show an increase in the number of cases and deaths for the second day in a row. Officials, including Ministry of Health Spokesperson, warn about normalization and the resurgence of coronavirus with another peak! Alborz, Qazvin and Khuzestan show increasing number of deaths and cases. Mazandaran and Golestan report “red” situation in 7 counties. Air pollution remains a major concern and a promoting factor helping coronavirus to infect more people! Widespread power outages across the country in the height of winter adds on to the devastating situation, more people trying to warm themselves in closed spaces! Islamic Republic officials have nothing to say about any of these but asking people to do “lower their use, wear thicker clothes and choose between poisoned air or power loss.”
Sima Sadat Lari reported 98 COVID-19 deaths in Iran in the past 24 hours while 6,408 tested positive for the novel coronavirus. She also raised concern about increasing chance of UK fast-spreading variant to go unleashed if people don’t follow protocols! However, None of these has stopped officials to relax even more restrictions! Alborz has reopened ALL businesses while air pollution is at the highest danger level! Schools are reopening in a week in “yellow” and “blue” cities!
Basic Reproduction Rate (R0) and graphs depict 11 months of devastating situation in Iran while Islamic Republic has made everything worse any chance they had! Testing remains in the same range while officials had promised the daily tests will reach 100,000 “soon.”
R0: 4.20
Total: 1,299,022 (+6,408)
Dead: 56,360 (+98)
Recovered: 1,088,456
Critical: 4,507 (-61)
Admitted: 154,206 (-410)
Tests: 8,262,166 (9.9% of the population, assuming each test was performed on 1 person)
Cover: Erfan Khoshkho
