TEHRAN: A senior Iranian health official has declared a coronavirus red alert covering the entire country as daily deaths and cases increase at an alarming rate, Iranian state TV reported on Friday.
Iran, one of the Middle Eastern countries hardest hit by the pandemic, has been divided up into white, orange/yellow and red regions based on the number of infections and deaths.
The death toll rose by 144 to 23,952 on Friday, while the total number of identified cases spiked by 3,049 to 416,198, health ministry spokeswoman Sima Sadat Lari said on television.
“The color classification doesn’t make sense anymore. We no longer have orange and yellow. The entire country is red,” deputy health minister Iraj Harirchi said on television.
“If the current course continues, the death toll will reach 45,000,” he added, without giving a time frame.
In the northwestern city of Tabriz, for instance, the number of hospitalized patients had jumped from under 40 a day to 160, and in the Shi’ite Muslim holy city of Qom it had increased from 10 a day to 160, Harirchi said, again without providing a time period for the increases.
He said only a 95% use of masks and a 50% fall in gatherings could reduce the death toll.
Whole of Iran on coronavirus red alert due to rise in deaths
https://arab.news/2d2zq
Whole of Iran on coronavirus red alert due to rise in deaths
- “If the current course continues, the death toll will reach 45,000,” the deputy health minister said
- He said only a 95% use of masks and a 50% fall in gatherings could reduce the death toll
Syrian Interior Ministry foils terror plot, arrests cell members
- Security forces make arrests as cell attempts to set up Grad-type rocket launchers for attacking populated areas
- Investigations reveal suspects were planning more attacks, had contact with external groups
LONDON: Syria’s Interior Ministry announced on Tuesday that it had thwarted a planned attack in the Mezzeh area of Damascus and had arrested more members of a terror cell preparing strikes on populated areas of the capital.
Security forces arrested members of the cell as they attempted to set up Grad-type rocket launchers. They, along with other cell members arrested last week, are accused of attacks targeting the Mezzeh area and a nearby military airport.
Forces seized the launching platforms before they could be used. Investigations revealed that the suspects were planning more attacks and had contact with external groups, according to the Syrian Arab News Agency.
The ministry announced earlier this month the arrest of members of a terror cell linked to attacks in the Mezzeh area and its military airport, after weeks of surveillance of rocket launching sites in Daraya and Kafr Souseh.
Authorities from the Syrian Arab Republic said that the launching platforms and drones used by the cell in the attacks had been sourced from Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah, the SANA added.
