Iran Registers First Case of New Coronavirus Strain

Just days after officials claimed there were no cases of the new highly contagious variant of coronavirus in Iran, the first case has now been registered. The strain was first identified in the United Kingdom and was thought to be brought in by an Iranian returning to the country from the UK, said health minister Saeed Namaki. At the same time the health ministry spokeswoman Sima-Sadat Lari reported that Iran had recorded its lowest daily death toll, below 100, in nearly seven months. She confirmed that 98 people had died from Covid-19 in the 24-hour period spanning January 4 and January 5.

“Unfortunately, we found the first case of the mutated British Covid-19 from a dear compatriot who had returned from England... and who was admitted to one of our private hospitals,” Namaki told state TV. “We did not find any trace of this virus in the patient’s relatives.” When the patient arrived in Iran his test was negative, Namaki added, “but since he was very knowledgeable and vigilant from day one, he isolated himself completely.”

A day earlier, Arezoo Fallahi, a spokeswoman for Kurdistan University of Medical Sciences, had reported that the patient in question was a “Kurdish doctor”, but Namaki denied this and said “this colleague of ours was tested repeatedly and more than 240 people who had been in contact with him were checked as well but, fortunately, no trace of the mutated British Covid-19 was found in any of them.”

Provinces Round-up

With the hospitalization of 255 new people in the last 24 hours in Mazandaran, the total number of hospitalizations in the province reached 1,272. As of January 5, 37 of these patients are being treated at intensive care units.

In Golestan in the last 24 hours, nine more people lost their lives to Covid-19. Currently 449 coronavirus patients are hospitalized in the province. Of this number, 93 are in ICUs and 36 were using ventilators to breathe. Dr. Abdolreza Fazel, the president of Golestan University of Medical Sciences, said that although infections in the province had been on a downward curve, the situation remained very unstable.

The number of infections in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer Ahmad is on the rise, and Dr. Parviz Yazdanpanah, president of Kohgiluyeh and Boyer Ahmad University of Medical Sciences, said it was because people were not complying with health protocols. Following the death of another person in the last 24 hours, the official death toll in the province since the coronavirus outbreak began has now reached 409. Currently 20 Covid-19 patients are being treated at ICUs in the province.

With the hospitalization of 42 new patients with Covid-19 symptoms in the last 24 hours the total number of hospitalizations in Alborz has reached 354, of whom 106 have tested positive. With the death of one more Covid-19 patient the death toll in the province now stands at 2,599.

According to the latest figures, currently 196 Covid-19 patients are hospitalized in Zanjan. Of this number six were admitted in the last 24 hours. In the same time period one more coronavirus patient died, bringing the death toll in the province since the coronavirus outbreak to 1,103.

Iran’s Latest Coronavirus Statistics

In her daily briefing for January 5, the health ministry spokeswoman Dr. Sima Sadat Lari announced the official coronavirus statistics for the last 24 hours:

Dr. Lari reported that currently four Iranian cities are on red alert, 43 cities are in an orange state of alert and 401 are yellow.

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