Covid-19 Daily Deaths Drop

EghtesadOnline: Iran’s overnight fatalities from the coronavirus disease, Covid-19, dropped sharply to 112 on Friday, health officials said, down by nearly 30% compared to Wednesday.

News ID: ۷۵۰۷۶۱

22 August 2020

“The newly reported deaths took the national toll to 20,376,” Health Ministry Spokeswoman Sima Sadat Lari was quoted as saying by ISNA.

She added that the 2,206 freshly identified cases have raised the national tally to 354,764.

According to the health official, despite a decline in the number of “red” zones across the country, 114 counties are still on red alert and 133 have an alarming status.

“So far, 305,866 have recovered from the infectious disease or been discharged from hospital, but 3,794 are in critical condition,” Lari said.

Iran has administered 2.98 million diagnostic tests to detect Covid-19.

President Hassan Rouhani on Thursday said his administration is both looking to develop a local vaccine and to pre-purchase vaccine doses from countries successful in immunization.

Rouhani also hinted at school reopenings during the coronavirus taskforce meeting, saying the country needed to draw on previous experiences handling other occasions of public gathering.

Noting that the widespread outbreak was not able to close down businesses, postpone university entrance exams, or cancel mourning for the martyrdom of Imam Hussein (PBUH), the president said, “We should guarantee and preserve the health of students by carefully following protocols. We should not let the pandemic interfere with their education.”

Global cases of the respiratory illness climbed to 22.88 million and deaths crossed 798,000.