Ministry Reports New Record Rise in Virus Cases
TEHRAN (Dispatches) -- New coronavirus infections in Iran have risen by 12,543 in the past 24 hours, a record high, taking the cumulative total to 762,068, the health ministry said on Sunday.
Ministry spokeswoman Sima Sadat Lari said that 459 people had died in the past 24 hours, pushing the death toll in the country to 41,493.
On Saturday, President Hassan Rouhani said Iran will impose stricter restrictions from next Saturday, as the country battles a third wave of COVID-19.
The toughest measures - classified by health officials as "red” or level 3 - will be imposed in the capital Tehran and about 100 other towns and cities.
Non-essential businesses and services will be shut and cars will not be allowed to leave or enter, Deputy Health Minister Alireza Raisi said in a televised media briefing.
Iranian health officials have devised a color-coding system that denotes the severity of the coronavirus outbreak in the country.
"The goal is not to shut down people’s businesses, but we have to set limits,” Raisi said. Some 150 towns and cities are rated "orange” or level 2, he said.
In these, one-third of employees can go to work whereas in 155 towns where the rating is "yellow” or level 1 two-thirds of the workforce can work from their workplaces.
"Shutdowns are not limited to jobs, but also include universities, schools and training centers,” Rouhani said. "In the red and orange cities, training will take place remotely.”
The government on Tuesday imposed restrictions for one month in major cities requiring all non-essential businesses to close at 6 p.m.
U.S. sanctions are preventing Iran from making advance payment
Ministry spokeswoman Sima Sadat Lari said that 459 people had died in the past 24 hours, pushing the death toll in the country to 41,493.
On Saturday, President Hassan Rouhani said Iran will impose stricter restrictions from next Saturday, as the country battles a third wave of COVID-19.
The toughest measures - classified by health officials as "red” or level 3 - will be imposed in the capital Tehran and about 100 other towns and cities.
Non-essential businesses and services will be shut and cars will not be allowed to leave or enter, Deputy Health Minister Alireza Raisi said in a televised media briefing.
Iranian health officials have devised a color-coding system that denotes the severity of the coronavirus outbreak in the country.
"The goal is not to shut down people’s businesses, but we have to set limits,” Raisi said. Some 150 towns and cities are rated "orange” or level 2, he said.
In these, one-third of employees can go to work whereas in 155 towns where the rating is "yellow” or level 1 two-thirds of the workforce can work from their workplaces.
"Shutdowns are not limited to jobs, but also include universities, schools and training centers,” Rouhani said. "In the red and orange cities, training will take place remotely.”
The government on Tuesday imposed restrictions for one month in major cities requiring all non-essential businesses to close at 6 p.m.
U.S. sanctions are preventing Iran from making advance payment
to the global COVAX facility set up to provide COVID-19 vaccines to poorer countries, the Iranian government said Friday. Lari said Iran’s early payments for vaccines to the COVAX global facility have been held up because of tough U.S. financial sanctions against the Islamic Republic. Food, medicine and other humanitarian supplies are exempt from sanctions that Washington reimposed on Tehran after President Donald Trump walked away from a 2015 international deal over Iran’s nuclear program.But the U.S. measures, which target sectors including oil and financial activities, have deterred some foreign banks from processing financial transactions with Iran deals, which Tehran says has frequently disrupted efforts to import essential medicines and other humanitarian items. "Our country’s pre-payment to participate in COVAX is under way, but due to the cowardly sanctions of the Americans and the problems in the transfer of currency, this has not happened yet,” Lari said.