TEHRAN (Dispatches) – The World Health Organization’s representative in Iran, Christoph Hamelmann, on Monday hailed the Islamic Republic’s response to the coronavirus outbreak. Hamelmann met with the president of Hamedan University of Medical Sciences, praising efforts made by provincial health officials to launch production lines for protective gears. Health Ministry spokesman Sima Sadat Lari reported 215 new deaths from the disease in the past 24 hours, which took the combined death toll to 17,405 in Iran, and the number of confirmed cases rose by 2,598 to 312,035.