It’s the first day of the week, and as usual, it’s Rouhani’s day! President of Islamic Republic shamelessly asking people to forget about weddings for the time being like people have a lot of other things to be happy about! While more than half the country is in despair because of soaring number of COVID-19 infections, he said, “We must work, businesses must be open, factories must be open, people should come and go but at the same time social distancing must be followed too. The people asking for closing of our businesses are “anti-revolutionary” and should not be taken seriously.” I wonder if it’s because of his old age or he’s just high, but somebody should have said, “Mr. President, this is not possible.” Also, calling experts who care about Iranians’ lives as “enemy” just shows how narrow-minded the regime is.
Rouhani continued by saying, “What’s the problem if people go to mosques for prayers but obey the social distancing rules?” The problem is, when mosques are open, it induces the normal situation in people’s minds and they won’t follow the rules, besides, there is nobody to enforce those rules. Religious people would probably say “whatever happens is God’s will” but in reality, their suffering could be prevented. Ignoring reports from Khuzestan and other provinces in critical condition that Eid Fitr gatherings and prayer have contributed to their current situation, Rouhani announced all “yellow” zones should resume Friday Prayers from June 21 in addition to the “white” areas.
The president continued, “We have no other choice but resume our normal life, and adapt to living with the virus. This is a long lasting epidemic and we don’t know when it might end.” He added, “We should not say “second or third waves” are coming, this would disrupt public’s opinions and make them worried.” What he means to say is, let everybody go about their business as usual and if they died, they died, nothing could have been done!
National Corona Combating Task Force also decided to reopen concert venues and movie theaters at 50% capacity from June 21, educational institutions and Quran classes from June 14. All of this when every day a new province is announcing their numbers are going up. Islamic Republic, however, doesn’t care about any of that!
While Governors in 10 provinces have officially announced the “second wave”, head of Center for Infectious Disease Control said, “This is still the first wave which has reached some provinces a bit later than the others, we haven’t passed the first peak yet.” This is a direct contradiction to what other officials, including Hassan Rouhani had said multiple times. They had claimed the virus has been “controlled” and is in “containing” stage. IranTrue has been saying this for MONTHS, the virus has never been managed, let alone controlled! Dr. Erfani also said, “There is no evidence that the virus has weakened. There is a chance that we would have to deal with flu and COVID-19 in fall concurrently.”
Erfani continued, “Everybody is at risk of contracting the disease which may lead to death so I advise everybody to refrain from unnecessary travels.” He added, “I hope we don’t have to impose martial law in the country but if people don’t follow social distancing rules, we may have no choice.” He also repeated the same rhetoric that increased number of tests has led to finding more cases, which is totally misleading if you follow the graphs. While more active case finding could lead to increased number of cases, that’s not the case here, or it has minimum effect. The number of tests have stayed in the same range. Also, if that’s the case, then why does everybody keep blaming people?! Additionally, assuming that claim is correct, then because of lower number of tests, they must have undercounted the cases from day 1. And after any day with high number, they decrease tests figures to correspond.
2,269 new cases and 75 deaths in the past 24 hours have been confirmed. Kianoush Jahanpour said there have been no death in 15 provinces, however, there are 12 more deaths compared to yesterday’s numbers. Basic reproduction rate (R0) and growth factors remain above 1, indicating the ongoing crisis.
R0: 1.25
Total: 169,425 (+2,269)
Dead: 8,209 (+75)
Healed: 132,038
Critical: 2,578 (+5)
Admitted: 29,178 (-103)
Tests: 1,060,126 (Number of labs wasn’t mentioned in today’s news. Officials may have finally figured out there are discrepancies when they lie.)
Iran International Death Toll: 13,193 (Last updated on April 25)
