Fmr Iranian Amb to Vatican Khosrowshahi dies of COVID-19- *entire leadership exposed to virus*👀

[Dennis Donovan]

Link to tweet

Ali Arouzi ✔@aliarouzi

Senior cleric Khosrowshahi, who was once Iran’s ambassador to the Vatican dies in hospital of #coronavirus

9:02 AM - Feb 27, 2020

Link to tweet

Farnaz Fassihi ✔@farnazfassihi

#Iran coronavirus
More officials test positive. Masoumeh Ebtekar, highest ranking female, & MP Zolnour head of parliament’s national security committee.

Yesterday Ebtekar was with Rouhani & cabinet.#كرونا

Hadi Nili ✔@HadiNili

معصومه ابتکار، معاون رییس?جمهوری ایران، که تایید شده به ویروس کرونا مبتلا ست، طبق عکس?های منتشرشده، دیروز در جلسه هیات دولت شرکت داشته. از جمله حدود سه متر با خود رئیس?جمهور حسن روحانی فاصله داشته.

Iranian Vice President Masoumeh Inkatar, who has been confirmed to be infected with the coronavirus, was reportedly attending a cabinet meeting yesterday. It was about three meters away from President Hassan Rouhani himself.

9:12 AM - Feb 27, 2020

[Iliyah]

1. Shock wave . . .

Also the Health Minister of Iran is also infected with the coronavirus.

RIP

[dalton99a]

2. Iran has a far higher fatality rate than seen elsewhere

https://time.com/5791516/iran-doctors-coronavirus-middle-east/
Doctors Inside Iran Believe Coronavirus Is More Serious Than Reported, and Getting Worse
By Tara Kangarlou
February 27, 2020 7:54 AM EST


A Tehran Municipality worker cleans a metro train to avoid the spread of the COVID-19 illness on Feb. 26, 2020
Atta Kenare—AFP via Getty Images

With dozens of publicly known cases and multiple deaths, Iran is now the epicenter of the coronavirus in the Middle East. Doctors inside the Islamic Republic say the country is now grappling with an “epidemic,” and the response has been hampered not just by government inaction and disinformation but also economic sanctions.

“We think that this virus has been in Iran for the past three to four weeks and has circulated throughout the country. Right now in Iran we are facing a coronavirus epidemic,” said a senior medical doctor at the Masih Daneshvari hospital in Tehran, the country’s top pulmonary public hospital and the main facility overseeing coronavirus patients.

Public officials have not confirmed how the disease arrived in Iran, but it appears to be the locus for the regional outbreak. So far, Afghanistan, Georgia, Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, and Oman reported their first cases of coronavirus, all linked to passengers traveling from Iran.

Since it first announced the presence of COVID-19 last week, Iran has so far reported a total of 245 cases and 26 deaths, a far higher fatality rate than seen elsewhere. The doctor, who requested anonymity to speak freely, said the official tally vastly underestimates the true number of cases. “We didn’t have a way to test people earlier and don’t have the capacity to screen everyone,” he said, in a telephone interview. “Let me put it this way, if in general two out of 100 corona patients die, in Iran, if we now have 20 deaths that means we have 1,000 infected patients.”

[Dennis Donovan]

3. Theocracies never fair well in the face of science-based crises

Nope. Ne'er-do-well at all.

[superpatriotman]

7. We are about to find that out here

More theocrats in charge since Jamestown

[Dennis Donovan]

8. Pence involvement makes this even-more dangerous

We might fare better with *no one* in charge over Pence.

[DFW]

15. The virus vs. prayer-based healing sessions

Let me guess who gets the best odds..............

[C_U_L8R]

6. Sure wish they'd be disinfecting the public transit here and then some

Trump has put us all at risk.

[killaphill]

4. Call me a conspiracy theorist....

But is there any possibility the Trump administration had anything to do with this? I wouldn't put it past them. And given their hostility to Iran.....

[Dennis Donovan]

5. No, this is all due to their incompetent leadership in Iran

Amateur hour since 1979.

[Midnight Writer]

13. Right. We just saw a visibly sick Iranian official on TV interacting freely with other officials.

And yesterday we saw, right here in the USA, our newly appointed Corvid-19 Czar wiping his nose with his hand and then shaking hands of others.

[Dennis Donovan]

14. I'm beginning to wonder who's in bigger trouble, us or them?

[tblue37]

16. The viral epicenter in Iran is the holy city of Qom. Pilgrims from all over visit Qom

and then go home. All that travel causes a lot of mixing in close quarters, followed by wide dispersal of infected pilgrims.

This is why Saudi Arabia has just closed its borders to pilgrims from other countries. If the virus is still out of control this summer, they won't even allow foreign pilgrims n for Gajj.

[Delphinus]

17. I was shocked

when I heard today that Qom is NOT closing their houses of prayer (or their shrines, can't recall which).

[Dennis Donovan]

9. More:

Link to tweet

Farnaz Fassihi ✔@farnazfassihi

2/ So far six Iranian officials & prominent figures have coronavirus. One died today.
1 cabinet member; 1 deputy health minister; 2 lawmakers; 1 mayor; 1 prominent cleric & former Vatican ambassador.
Anyone else?#كرونا #Iran

10:16 AM - Feb 27, 2020

[dalton99a]

10. All the door handles they touched and all the people they talked to

[Dennis Donovan]

11. This could cripple, if not outright decapitate the Iranian govt.

Never a good time to be an Iranian national, but now might be the worst.

[Dennis Donovan]

12. Kick - this is a geopolitical story, as well as being a biomedical story.