TEHRAN -- The first Iranian oxygen shipment has arrived in Afghanistan’s Herat Province as the war-torn country is grappling with a new wave of the coronavirus.
Abdul Hakim Tamana, the head of Herat’s public health department, said the first oxygen tanker arrived in Herat from the Iranian city of Mashhad on Saturday.
According to the report, the Health Department of Razavi Khorasan Province in cooperation with the Consul General of Afghanistan in Mashhad and the Consul General of Iran in Herat secured a license for the consignment to leave Iran.
More shipments of medical oxygen will arrive in Afghanistan in the coming days to help the country cope with a shortage of oxygen in Herat and neighboring provinces to treat COVID-19 patients.
According to IRNA news agency, Afghanistan’s acting health minister, Wahid Majrooh, has recently said that 3,500 oxygen concentrators will enter Afghanistan from Iran soon.
As Afghanistan is grappling with the third wave of the pandemic, the oxygen shortage has become a major problem in the country’s west. The Afghan Health Ministry has recently warned of a “humanitarian catastrophe” over the shortage.
Under an agreement between Iran and Afghanistan, Iran is set to send oxygen to Herat on a weekly basis.
Since the outbreak of the new coronavirus in Afghanistan, Iran has provided the country with medical supplies and equipment to help fight the deadly pandemic.