Health Ministry Denies “Herd Immunity” Accusations

President Hassan Rouhani’s claim that 25 million Iranians had probably already contracted coronavirus and many more millions of cases would follow continues to spark debate, days on from the original controversy. 

On July 18, Rouhani quoted health ministry research when making the announcement, adding that “30 to 35 million Iranians are likely to be exposed to coronavirus in the coming months.” A day later, Dr. Mohammad Reza Mahboub-Far, an epidemiologist and a member of the National Coronavirus Taskforce, described Rouhani’s statements as “a confirmation of the policy of herd immunity,” adding that this could amount to “genocide” for Iran. 

On July 21, government health officials appeared to be trying to repair the unintended consequences of the president’s comments, despite claims that Rouhani’s statements were based on empirical data. Deputy Health Minister Alireza Raeesi said the number Rouhani quoted was based on research conducted through serological tests and refuted assertions that this meant the health ministry had embraced a policy of “herd immunity.” He emphasized that serological tests are not valid to diagnose coronavirus and neither the World Health Organization nor other international health research bodies would have ever claimed to have diagnosed coronavirus infections using this method. “These tests are only meant to investigate the situation of infections in an area and then, through mathematical modeling, we can estimate the rate of infection,” he said.

Raeesi then reported that the number of cases in the provinces of Khuzestan, Kurdistan and Hormozgan was either stabilizing or declining, but that case numbers had surged in Fars, Mazandaran and South Khorasan. Other provinces, he said, were in an “orange” state, or a serious state of alert.

One of many problems people have faced during the pandemic is the difficulty of moving and changing places of residence. In a letter to the judiciary and the Association of Real Estate Consultants, Mohammad Eslami, Minister of Roads and Urban Development, reiterated that leases for residential properties remain in effect until three months after the health ministry officially announces that the coronavirus pandemic is over. Tenants cannot be evicted against their will during this period, but added that it was a different matter if the property is actually sold.

 

Provinces Round-up

Tehran has been in a “red” or state of high emergency for more than a week and the number of infections is rising by the day. Unlike in March and April, when almost all the wards in hospitals were dedicated to treating coronavirus patients, hospitals are now treating non-coronavirus patients as well. As a result, said Dr. Hamid Emadi, head of the infectious diseases ward at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Hospital, they have less capacity to admit Covid-19 patients. “Because of this,” he added, “we have no available capacity for coronavirus patients and if such a patient is in a critical condition we have practically no room for the patient. The number of patients we have already exceeds our capacity.”

The province of East Azerbaijan has been in a “red” state for close to two weeks, and according to Abbas Ali Dorosti, vice president of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, in the last few months approximately 1,500 medical staff in the province have been infected. He said the number of coronavirus patients in a critical condition has increased and currently around one-fourth of all coronavirus patients in East Azerbaijan are hospitalized in intensive care units (ICUs). He added that, at the moment, there are around 850 coronavirus patients in hospitals in East Azerbaijan, and out of those, approximately 200 are in ICU wards.

The number of hospitalizations in Khuzestan province has been falling for the last few days and if this trend continues and health guidelines are followed, Khuzestan will move out of a state of emergency, according to Dr. Farhad Abolnejadian, president of Ahvaz Jondishapur University of Medical Sciences. For the last five days, he added, less than three people per every 100,000 of the population had been hospitalized. He explained if the numbers continued in this way, after 14 days, the province will be re-classified as an “orange” state, or less at risk.

In a number of “red” areas in Iran, public gathering places, including religious centers and sites, have been closed. But in some provinces religious authorities have opposed this decision, making it more difficult to lock down religious sites. In Zanjan province, however, Mokhtar Karami, head of the province’s Department of Religious Endowment and Charity Affairs, announced that all religious sites, including mosques, shrines and prayer halls, which had been locked down again on July 6, would stay closed until the National Coronavirus Taskforce decided otherwise.

Also in Zanjan, Nahid Kamkar, head of the province’s Bureau of Nursing Affairs, reported that at each of Zanjan’s hospitals, between 10 and 12 percent of nurses had been infected by coronavirus and, as a result, Zanjan has a shortage of nurses.

With the surge in coronavirus infections, the city of Arak, the capital of Markazi province, is now in a “red” state, according to Ali Aghazadeh, Markazi’s governor. To control the situation, he said, restrictions would be imposed in the Arak metropolitan area and other red cities in the province. He added that gatherings of more than 10 people in these cities could face bans. According to Aghazadeh, Arak’s Amir Al Mo'menin Hospital was full to capacity and the hospital has been forced to send coronavirus patients to Ayatollah Khansari Hospital. There are very few hospital beds in the province, so if the situation continued to worsen, coping with it would be problematic.

The province of Fars has been “red” for some days now. Reporting that coronavirus infections in the province have been surging over the last three weeks and 21 out of 36 cities in the province are now “red,” Anayatollah Rahimi, governor of Fars, said that currently 91 percent of beds reserved for non-ICU patients and 93 percent of ICU beds in the province’s hospitals have all been occupied by coronavirus patients.

On July 21, the the Ministry of Health declared the province of Kerman “red.” During the first peak of the epidemic in March and April, there were no insurmountable problems in the province and the situation was manageable but the number of patients has risen sharply since June, and now all hospitals in Kerman are overwhelmed with Covid-19 patients, according to Morteza Hashemian, vice president of Kerman University of Medical Sciences. According to Dr. Hashemian, currently 700 patients who are suspected of having or confirmed to have contracted coronavirus are hospitalized in Kerman.

The four cities of Ardebil, Meshgin Shahr, Parsabad and Khalkhal, the most populous cities in Ardebil province, have witnessed a surge in hospital visits and hospitalizations in the last few days, announced Shahram Habibzadeh, president of Ardebil University of Medical Sciences. In the last 24 hours alone, 71 new Covid-19 patients, 50 in a critical condition, have been hospitalized. He said 11 people with Covid-19 had died in Ardebil. According to Dr. Habibzadeh, the number of coronavirus patients hospitalized had reached 382 and hospitals face a crisis as the number of patients increases day by day.

In Gilan province, 30 percent of coronavirus cases are either people who have traveled to the province, or locals who have had contact with them, reported Dr. Abtin Heydarzadeh, vice president of Gilan University of Medical Sciences. The trend of coronavirus infections in the province is also going upward and currently 300 Covid-19 patients are hospitalized across the province, he said, adding that approximately 30 of these patients are in ICU wards and connected to ventilators.

Mazandaran province is “red” and, according to Simin Babaei, spokeswoman for Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, 1,000 university medical staff members and other frontline workers have been infected with coronavirus, forcing others to step in to fight the second coronavirus wave in the province.

The health ministry declared Bushehr a “red” province. In the 24-hour period ending on July 21, 56 new coronavirus patients were hospitalized, bringing the total number of current Covid-19 hospitalizations to 346, of whom 55 are kept in ICU wards, reported Saeed Kashmiri, secretary of Bushehr Coronavirus Taskforce.

 

More Misleading Numbers

The provinces of Lorestan, Alborz, East Azerbaijan, West Azerbaijan, Ilam, Bushehr, Razavi Khorasan, Khuzestan, Zanjan, Golestan, Mazandaran, Kerman and Fars are “red,” and the provinces of Tehran, Isfahan, Bushehr, Hormozgan, Qazvin, Markazi, North Khorasan, South Khorasan, Semnan, Ardebil, Sistan and Baluchistan, Hamedan, Ardebil and Kohgiluyeh and Boyer Ahmad are in the “orange” state, announced Dr. Sima Sadat Lari, the health ministry’s spokeswoman.

As has become customary in her daily briefings, the spokeswoman presented a distorted list of afflicted provinces. According to the criteria announced by the Ministry of health and based on reports published by the ministry itself and presented by provincial health officials, the provinces of Tehran, South Khorasan, Sistan and Baluchistan and Kermanshah are also “red” and the provinces of Hormozgan, Kurdistan, Qom and Yazd should be classified as “orange.” 

In her daily briefing, Dr. Sadat Lari also announced coronavirus statistics for the last 24 hours:

 

- New coronavirus cases: 2,625

- New hospitalizations: 1,977

- Iran’s total cases since the initial outbreak: 278,827

- Total coronavirus tests conducted in Iran: 2,200,000

- New fatalities: 229 — a record number

- Total death toll since the outbreak: 14,634

 

This is part of IranWire's coronavirus chronology. Read the full chronology