The coronavirus outbreak death tally in Iran surpasses 22,000

The Coronavirus death tally in Iran was over 22,000 as of Wednesday, according to the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK).

This is the most recent death tally for the following provinces:

• Tehran 2,900
• Qom 2200
• Gilan 2,000
• Isfahan 1,720
• Mazandaran 1,720
• Khuzestan 940
• Golestan 880
• Alborz is 800
• Fars 420
• Zanjan 390
• Yazd 370
• Qazvin 350
• North Khorasan 240

Despite the death tally, regime’s President Hassan Rouhani still decided to defend his administration’s plan to send people back to work, claiming that the regime was “in the process of controlling the virus outbreak”, something they were “not that anxious” about because the hospitals were “ready” and had plenty of “empty beds and ICUs”.

To make it clear, these are lies; something admitted by the Health Minister, who said the regime has not yet “controlled and contained the virus”, and Alireza Zali, head of Tehran’s National Coronavirus Combat Taskforce (NCCT), who said that “the biggest strategic risk is to undermine the preventive measures and increase the traffic. This can lead to major damage in containing the virus”.

While Dr Mohammad Mehdi Goya, Director General of Infectious Diseases at Health Ministry, in a speech to the NCCT where Rouhani was present, said that the infection rate was still rising across the country, that the curve was not being flattened, and that it was rapidly going up in some provinces.

Still, Rouhani said: “If we tell people to stay at home because of this contagious disease, it’s the easiest thing for the government to do, but it’s not possible. There are some who are day labourers, if they don’t work one day, they wouldn’t have any income, and they can’t make ends meet… What should we do for them? What should we do for people whose businesses have been closed for the past two months, who have invoices, debts, and rents to pay?… Earlier, our struggle was to stay at home, but now it’s to carry on economic activities. We have no other choice.”

In case Rouhani is not looking at how other countries are helping the people during the shutdown, here is some advice:

• Debt repayment (inc. mortgages and rent) holidays
• Encouraging people to work from home where they can
• Paying the wages of furloughed workers and self-employed people
• Increasing unemployment benefits
• Lowering requirements for sick pay

Unlike other countries, Iran could do this without increasing the national debt if Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei could part with a small fraction of his $200bn net worth.

Maryam Rajavi, the President of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) said: “For Khamenei and Rouhani, the lives and well-being of the people are worthless. They only want to protect their regime from the threat of uprising. The criminal decision to send people to work is a crime against humanity and will cause countless number of victims. The deadly impact of this decision is not going to be confined to Iran’s borders and will pose the risk of a new wave of the virus outbreak in the region and other countries.”