Posted on 02/21/2020 3:59:27 PM PST by nuconvert
Iran has officially the second largest number of Coronavirus (COVID-19) death toll after China with four confirmed deaths. Earlier reports said two patients died in Qom on Thursday, but officials did not say where did the new two deaths occured.
Meanwhile, Tehran has confirmed 13 more patients including 7 in Qom, 4 in Tehran and 2 in Rasht are positively diagnosed with Coronavirus, Kianush Jahanpur, head of public relations and information center of Iran's Ministry of Health said in a tweet Friday afternoon February 21.
Most of the new cases include people living in Qom and those who have visited the religious city south of Tehran during the past week.
Jahanpur had said earlier that 735 patients with symptoms similar to flu have been hospitalized in various cities.
Individual social media users including Reza Younesi and Hossein Nouraninejad have written in detail about the death of their relatives in Qom where a holy shrine has thousands of visitors every day and officials have introduced initiatives to prevent the people from touching and kissing the walls and ornaments around the shrine.
According to conspiracy theories fueled by Iranians' distrust of the Islamic government, the number of cases of death and infliction are far more than what has been announced and the government is playing down the reports about the epidemic as a Parliamentary election takes on Friday.
Jahanpur tweeted later on Friday that the World Health Organization (WHO) sent a fourth shipment of Coronavirus diagnosis kits from Dubai to Tehran in the morning.
Meanwhile, confirming the tweets posted by Jahanpur, the Health Ministry's media adviser Alireza Vahabzadeh said that so far four of the 18 confirmed Coronavirus patients have died.
He added that two patients are being cared for at a hospital in Babaol in Mazandaran Province north of Tehran.
Officials in Tehran, including Hamid Reza Goudarzi the deputy for security affairs at the governor-general's office have said that "there is no reason for concern about Coronavirus in Tehran." However, he said that an "emergency meeting" has been held in the capital on Friday about protecting citizens against disease.
However, like Health Mkinistry Officials, Goudarzi called on Iranians not to pay attention to rumors.
In another development, Deputy Health Minister Karim Hemmati said security officials are working hard to counter fake news about Coronavirius, including "fabricated" correspondences between the Health Minister and his deputies about the spread of the virus in Iran.
In Dehloran in Ilam Province a few people have been reportedly arrested for spreading rumors about the virus, the media quoted the city's Prosecutor as saying.
The Culture Ministry has issued a statement calling on the media not to publish "hypotheses and inaccurate reports" about the disease and avoid publishing comments by non-experts.
In another development Mahan Airline, said to be partly owned by the Revolutionary Guard, which has been accused of spreading the virus by continuing its flights to and from China has announced that it flew to China at the government's order to carry humanitarian aid, adding that it suspended its passenger flights a few weeks ago.
Meanwhile, there has been rising concern about the shortage of masks and hygienic gel at the pharmacies. However, officials say there is no shortage as 15 companies produce 1.5 million masks per day. Nevertheless, Vice-President Es'haq Jahangiri has called on the companies to boost their production.
In the meantime, there have been complaints about the rising price of masks. Mohammad Mosaed, a reporter in Tehran tweeted that he had to pay five times higher than usual for a mask at a Tehran pharmacy.
The prosecutor of Fardis near Tehran confirmed on his Instagram page that some outlets offer hygienic gels and masks at several times their usual price, but law enforcement officers are trying to control the market.
Lol.
The word from inside Iran is that people are frightened.
No one trusts the information they’re getting from the regime. Everyone thinks the numbers are much higher. There are rumors that at least 9 people are dead (not 4).
As far as I’ve heard, there are only 4 British people from that ship who have tested positive and have been removed to Japanese hospitals (?)
That’s not a lot to medevac out.
Yea, no kidding. But I suspect if Iran tried forcibly sending their carriers here on purpose, those people would spill the beans, once out of the long reach of the Imam himself.
“The word from inside Iran is that people are frightened.
No one trusts the information theyre getting from the regime. Everyone thinks the numbers are much higher. There are rumors that at least 9 people are dead (not 4).”
As far as I can remember, Iran is the ONLY country other than China that is now vectoring-out carriers. God only knows how bad it must now be there.
Just use the usual x10 multiplier, I guess.
I think 100 to 1000 is closer for a multiplier, in places where they’re vectoring-off people. It doesn’t mean, necessarily, that they’re intentionally under-reporting (although that can certainly be some or most of it), but they may just be so overwhelmed or the bug is so quiet in most people (not showing symptoms, yet) that they don’t even intend to give out crappy numbers.
They may well only have only a few more than the few symptomatic examples theyve cited. But its in the wild, scattered in a nation without border control, and limited medical facilities. It is unlikely to stay that way with few cases for long.
I hope and pray you are right. It is interesting watching this unfold but I’ve already gotten through the denile phase.
“Just use the usual x10 multiplier, I guess.”
Yup. Good rule of thumb
Baghdad Bob... ‘no tanks’ he’d say - - while tanks could be seen in the background. Third world barker...
I of course will overlook your unwarrented suggestion of shallow thinking on my part regarding the situation, which as I’ve stated travelers can and do risk finding themselves in when traveling abroad...and when so it’s generally considered ‘unusual’ situations. All the more if they’re elderly folks.
(BTW The Brits did send a plane to get their people out.)
.....”It just appears to be media generated histrionics”.....
Thank you I agree... it’s one thing to be concerned it’s another thing to report 24/7 and have phone interviews etc. that just adds to the “sky is falling” hype that’s out there.
Gosh it’s in Iran - now the goats and camels are gonna get it.
It must be that, in the second and third week of January, that any businessmen and mid-level party officials who had an excuse to leave China “on business” did so.
It would be interesting to know how many sons of Central Committee members remain in China today.
Iran Bans Travelers from China, Crippling Plan to Boost Chinese Tourism
Tourism.
Riiiiight...
“The Iranian tour guide said he recently had traveled with one Chinese group from Iran into neighboring Turkey. “
Most of them came thru Turkey. Turkey didn’t stop its flights from China until about 2 wks ago.(I think Feb 4th)
UPDATE: Iran confirms 10 new cases, 5th death
Update 6:15 a.m. EST Feb 22: The numbers might sound low, but the surge in diagnosed novel coronavirus cases in Iran is boosting concerns among global health officials the outbreak could soon reach pandemic levels.
Irans health ministry confirmed 10 new cases of the virus bringing the countrys total to 28 and a fifth fatality.
The ripple effect among travelers, however, is sounding alarm bells among infectious disease experts.
According to the New York Times, cases confirmed in both Canada and Lebanon have been traced to travel to and from Iran.
The cases that we see in the rest of the world, although the numbers are small, but not linked to Wuhan or China, its very worrisome, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization, said Friday at a news conference at the agencys headquarters in Geneva. These dots are actually very concerning.
Kianoush Jahanpour, Irans health ministry spokesman, said that of the 10 latest reported cases, two were diagnosed in Tehran and eight are in Qom.
According to The Associated Press, two elderly patients died in Qom Wednesday and the two Tehran patients either visited or had links to Qom.
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