More than a thousand people have already died of the COVID-19 coronavirus in Iran according to official figures, and now one dies every ten minutes.
That’s what a spokesperson for the country’s health ministry said in a post on Twitter this past week. According to the Health Ministry, the death toll has reached 1,556 victims, including 123 people who died of the virus on Saturday.
“Based on our information, every ten minutes one person dies from the coronavirus and some 50 people become infected with the virus every hour in Iran,” Health Ministry spokesperson Kianush Jahanpour tweeted, according to Reuters.
The total number of people who tested positive for the coronavirus in Iran has exceeded 21,600, according to the spokesperson, who spoke at a daily news briefing. However, the spokesperson also said 7,913 patients had recovered from the disease and were discharged from hospitals in the country.
Jahanpour said 129 people died of the virus in Iran over the past 24 hours, according to the Tasnim News Agency. He added that 1,028 new cases were identified.
Iran has become the epicenter for the virus in the Middle East.
