While IRGC Commander-in-Chief and former Health Minister had promised they would provide COVID-19 vaccine, particularly “Noora” developed by the IRGC’s Baghiyatallah hospital, to US and other countries, head of the Baghiyatallah hospital said, Noora won’t be manufactured if it is not pre-ordered first! Another proof that the “domestic vaccine” charade of the Islamic Republic was all about money, regardless of how many lives were lost due to banning of US and UK vaccines by Khamenei and false hopes given by the current Vice President when he was CEO of “Execution of Imam Khomeini’s Order”, developer of COVIran Barekat. Dr. Abolghasemi even cast doubt over other “homegrown vaccine” projects and said, “It’s good that they are importing the vaccines,” a 180-degree shift from promoting domestic ones every second.
On the other hand, Nader Talebzadeh, a close advisor to Ebrahim Raisi and the Supreme Leader of Islamic Republic, claimed he knew about COVID-19 since 2007, when pilgrims in Hajj were getting sick with coughs and fever. He said: “The coronavirus was created to fight with Islamic passion of Iran and God searching spirit of Muslims in Hajj. It is an anti-Islamic virus!” He didn’t provide any evidence for his claims and did not elaborate if he was talking about flu and other respiratory diseases with same symptoms which predate Islam. His main evidence is flu being common in Saudi Arabia during Hajj, “why? It’s not cold there!” It is worth mentioning, Khamenei had made similar claims in his March 2020 speech, asserting the coronavirus was a biological attack against Islamic Republic by US and other enemies.
In the meantime, the regime continues using the ineffective Sinopharm as a propaganda tool and accelerating its vaccination program. According to Dr. Raisi, there is a 6-week window to vaccinate the majority of people before the next wave. However, ICU beds in Khuzestan are still occupied by COVID-19 patients, Khorasan Razavi’s daily death toll remains above national average and North Khorasan reports 13 deaths in 24hrs as a new high for the province.
The Ministry of Health claimed total of 35,047,143 shots have been administered in the country since February 9 while only 12,104,002 (14.40% of Iran population) are fully vaccinated with mostly Sinopharm. The Spokesperson also announced 487 died of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours and 20,219 tested positive for the novel coronavirus, a jump from the day before. According to Professor Holakoui of Tehran University, these numbers must be multiplied by 7 to come close to reality on the ground. Civil Registration Organization data indicates more than 277,000 died of the disease since February 2020. Graphs illustrate the five waves Iranians have gone through so far, due to deliberate mismanagement of the regime.
R0: 2.63
Total: 5,295,786 (+20,219)
Dead: 114,311 (+487)
Recovered: 4,568,236
Critical: 7,278 (-69)
Active Cases: 613,239 (-10,085)
Total Tests: 30,227,916
