ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Canada issued a travel advisory for Iran on Friday evening, urging its citizens to avoid non-essential travel to the country as the number of coronavirus cases and ensuing death toll in Iran continue to rise.
Kianoush Jahanpour, Iran Health Ministry spokesperson, put the official national coronavirus death toll at 43 and the number of confirmed cases at 593 at a press conference on Friday.
BBC Persia alleged on Friday that the death toll far exceeds the ministry’s numbers, saying that hospital sources count 210 people dead from the virus as of Thursday. Jahanpour vehemently denied the BBC figures, saying that the outlet is spreading “lies.”
Academic researchers have voiced suspicion over the officially recognized coronavirus numbers coming out of Iran. A study out of the University of Toronto, based off cross-referencing the death rates of infected areas, estimates that the size of the outbreak in Iran could be as high as 18,300 people.
Speaking to reporters at a press briefing on Friday, World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that a total of 97 cases of coronavirus across 11 countries have likely originated from people who became infected during recent travel to Iran.
Canada, New Zealand, Georgia, Belarus and seven other countries have traced confirmed cases of Covid-19, the deadly coronavirus strain currently spreading like wildfire across international borders, back to individuals who recently traveled to Iran.
Ghebreyesus also stated that 24 new cases of the virus, spread across 14 countries, originated in Italy.
"Our epidemiologists have been monitoring these developments continuously. We have now increased our assessment of the risk of spread and the risk of impact of COVID-19 to 'very high' at the global level," added the WHO director.
Kurdistan Regional Government Minister of Health Saman Hussein Muhammad said in a press conference in Sulaimani that 1,850 people who have returned to the region from Iran are currently in quarantine.
He announced the good news that 12 suspected cases tested yesterday came back negative, but added that they have yet to receive the results for three additional suspected cases.
World health experts have raised alarms, estimating that the novel coronavirus could infect anywhere between 40 and 80 percent of the world’s population at its peak.
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