Official Coronavirus Death Toll in Iran Nears 3,300

Iran raised the official death toll from the coronavirus pandemic to 3,294, adding 134 victims in the past 24 hours, the country’s Health Ministry said on Friday. Health Ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpur told state television on Friday that said the Islamic Republic’s total number of confirmed cases stood at 53,183, but added that 17,935 patients had now recovered. Iran leads the Middle East in pandemic statistics, with many saying Tehran had mismanaged the crisis early on, when its health workers tested for influenza rather than coronavirus. On Thursday, Ahmed al-Mandhari, director of the World Health Organization’s eastern Mediterranean region, urged Middle Eastern governments to increase their prevention efforts. “I cannot stress enough the urgency of the situation,” Mandhari said in a statement. “The increasing numbers of cases show that transmission is rapidly occurring at local and community levels.” He cited in particular the region’s war zones, stating: “New cases have been reported in some of the most vulnerable countries with fragile health systems.”