Coronavirus Could Break Iranian Society: The government has refused to impose quarantines and is encouraging people to visit the city of Qom, the center of the outbreak.

The Atlantic ^ | February 27, 2020 | Graeme Wood

[C19fan]

Picture the following sacred but unhygienic scene: Pilgrims from a dozen countries converge on one small city. They stay in cramped hotels, using communal toilets and eating meals together. For their main ritual, they converge on the tomb of a woman, the sister of a holy man, and as they get closer, they feel with rising intensity grief over her death and the deaths of her kin. The grief is a commandment: Each tear, according to one tradition, will be transformed in the afterlife into a pearl, and an angel will compensate them for their tears with a bucket of pearls that will be signs of their devotion when they arrive at the gate of paradise. But for now the bodily fluids are flowing, wiped away occasionally by bare hands, and the crowd is getting denser. A metal cage surrounds the tomb itself, and when the weeping pilgrims reach it, they interlace their fingers with its bars, and many press their face against it, fogging up the shiny metal with their breath. Some linger for minutes, some for seconds. In a single day, many thousands pass through the same cramped space—breathing the same air, touching the same surfaces, trading new and exotic diseases.

[C19fan]

Iran has not closed the Shiite pilgrimage of Qom. So hundreds if not thousands of Iranians and visitors are going through a Coronavirus affected site every day. They are going to spread the disease through out the Near East and Central Asia.

[rfp1234]

What will the Saudis do, block Iranians from the Hajj?

[C19fan]

The Saudis have blocked the Iranians before.

[SpaceBar]

Germ warfare. The last card in the deck.

[FreedomNotSafety]

2019-2020 US flu season statistics:
29,000,000/280,000/16,000/200
Cases/hospitalized/deaths/children deaths

Maybe Iran got something right for once.

[Nuke From Orbit]

This kind of thing can lead to war between factions.

[nuconvert]

They don’t care about their citizens, never have.

[MGunny]

Simplistic, yet brilliant way to spread a disease, even it means death to their own country men. Now, Iran needs to be sealed off , militarily.

[proust]

They are really going out of there way to get Trump.

[ctdonath2]

Reducing the surplus population.

[cloudmountain]

What will the Saudis do, block Iranians from the Hajj?

Excellent question.

This year the Hajj is from July 28-August 2 so the King has almost five months to think about it and prepare.

[cloudmountain]

Reducing the surplus population.

Shades of Ebeneezer Scrooge.

[blam]

"What will the Saudis do, block Iranians from the Hajj?"

Coronavirus prompts Saudi Arabia to limit travel to holy sites – months ahead of hajj pilgrimage

[Dogbert41]

I saw somewhere, maybe FOX that the Mecca is closed down right now.

[Wayne07]

You know Iran is screwed when the medical advice is coming from clerics. This isn't a joke:

* Before bedtime, drench some cotton in violet oil and apply onto your anus
* Comb your hair thoroughly
* Eat lots of apples & onions

[lightman]

God has been known to allow plagues to serve His purpose, eh, Pharoah?

[Wayne07]

You, Ben Rhodes, and Iranian President Rouhani - the axis of “Iran got it right”.

[bigbob]

Already have, after the Iranian VP was diagnosed with coronavirus:

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/02/trump-ready-coronavirus-live-updates-200226235731205.html

[LibWhacker]

encouraging people to visit the city of Qom

Way to go, you backward effers! I suggest you encourage every Iranian to kiss as many of his fellow countrymen with the disease as possible, all the while shouting Allahu Akbar!.

[FreedomNotSafety]

Do you disagree and believe that Iran should bar visitors?