Dr. Younesian warns about BA.2 spread, subvariant of Omicron, in Iran. The epidemiologist confirmed a few cases have been identified in the country and expressed his concern over its transmissibility. He said BA.2 is more transmissible than Omicron and another COVID-19 peak could happen. He emphasized the government should not lax the restrictions yet. He suggested nobody without complete vaccination should be able to use the public transportation during Persian New Year holidays.
Tehran Corona Combating Committee official claims the capital has passed the sixth wave’s peak but forewarned that COVID-19 is not over yet. Meanwhile, daily hospitalizations in Fars has reached 3-digit territory and Alborz‘s daily death toll has passed 2-digits.
The Islamic Republic “Supreme Leader” banned the reliable US and UK made vaccines, leading to tsunami of deaths during Delta wave. Khamenei promoted his foundation’s shot, COVIran Barekat, which failed miserably. Multiple “homegrown” vaccines, including PastoCoVac, COVPars, Fakhra, Noora, Spikogen, never met the expectations and none of them has published their results or received recognition/approval from international health organizations.
According to official definition of “full vaccination” and Ministry of Health data, since February 9, only 23,291,860 (27.72% of Iran population) are vaccinated against COVID-19 with these vaccines. It is estimated that more than 53 million Iranians are at risk of contracting Omicron. The majority of shots used in Iran are the ineffective Sinopharm and COVIran Barekat. WHO recommends 3 doses of Sinopharm to be effective against Delta but studies have found the vaccine ineffective against Omicron.
The Ministry of Health Spokesperson claimed 226 have died of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours and 9,312 tested positive for the novel coronavirus. Number of daily tests performed in the country continue to decline despite experts advice to have a more active case finding. Professor of Epidemiology at Tehran University believes these numbers must be multiplied by 7 and Civil Registration Organization data show more than 324,000 have died of the disease since February 2020.
R0: 2.08
Total: 7,060,741 (+9,312)
Dead: 137,064 (+226)
Recovered: 6,665,702
Critical: 4,027 (+75)
Active Cases: 257,975 (-4,428)
Total Tests: 47,335,696
