Deputy Health Minister blames people, yet again! Iraj Harirchi complained not all businesses closed at 6PM last night as the new curfew went into effect across the country for province capitals and big cities! While the efficacy of this plan is still in question, he hoped the organizations in charge of enforcing these protocols do their jobs! At the same time, Dr Minoo Mohraz, a member of National Task Force, said these plans won’t help anybody. She admitted the situation is dreadful and lack of oxygen in hospitals is prevalent. She invited authorities to hospitals to witness the devastating circumstances.
Tehran Governor blamed the government for the COVID-19 crisis in Iran. Bandpey said premature reopenings based on a fictional concept called “smart social distancing” was a big mistake! He added one of the main issues have been not using health experts in the decision making process. He said, low number of testing has been a major hurdle in diagnosing cases early. He also admitted “remote working” and the new curfew has no effect on the crowds in public transportation system in the capital.
It was reported that Bandpey had declined to close down Tehran for 2 weeks. Today, he said he agreed with the plan but it didn’t make it to the floor of National Task Force to be discussed. He said he would push the suggestion again. Iraj Harirchi also said nothing is going to work but the entire country must go in quarantine for at least 2 weeks! He was the one who said “quarantine is for pre-WW era and not effective,” the very first few days when coronavirus was reported in Iran. 9 months later and seems like he’s changed his mind after more than 39,000 people have lost their lives, according to highly undercounted and discredited data of Ministry of Health.
Hospitals across the country continue to struggle with the flood of patients. Director of Iran Nursing Organization sent a letter to the President of Islamic Republic, Hassan Rouhani, asking for the country to be closed down for two weeks. He wrote, “we know this may have social and economical consequences but certainly it would help the healthcare system.” He also asked for 30,000 new hires because the current staff are exhausted and not enough to tackle the devastating situation. He also demanded the unpaid benefits and salaries to be paid on time!
In Tehran, Dr Zali admitted the system has failed in containing the virus by not taking the right decisions, low number of tests, quarantining and premature reopenings. Head of Tehran Corona Combating Committee implied people don’t trust the system, by giving an example from Germany that people trusting the government helped them controlling the coronavirus. In Isfahan, deputy head of medical university admitted religious gatherings (Muharram, Arbain,….), schools reopening, and poor management have been parts of why COVID-19 is shattering all daily records!
Even Sima Sadat Lari warned the authorities that high number of cases and deaths should sound the alarms! According to her, 11,780 new cases were identified since yesterday and 462 passed away, both setting a new record for the deadly virus. The entire country remains in critical status. For the first time, number of daily tests passed 42,000. Positivity rate also increased to 27.6%, the highest since epidemic began in Iran. Health experts believe Iran needs at least 200,000 tests a day to make a dent on the vast majority of population who have not been tested yet!
Basic Reproduction Rate (R0), indicating how fast the virus is spreading, has increased to 2.57! Graphs depict the ever growing number of active cases. Critical cases rose as it has been the case in the past few months, after Muharram!
R0: 2.57
Total: 715,068 (+11,780)
Dead: 39,664 (+462)
Recovered: 536,105
Critical: 5,601 (+17)
Admitted: 139,299 (+5,907)
Tests: 5,344,821 (6.4% of the population, assuming each test was performed on 1 person)
Cover: Amin Nazari
