Measures to Curb Covid-19 Extended in Tehran

The unabated spread of coronavirus pandemic in Iran’s capital prompted officials to extend both a remote working policy and the suspension of the city’s restricted traffic zone to thin out its crowded public transport system.
With Tehran Province on red alert for weeks and the contagion showing no signs of slowing down in the country’s most populous region, Tehran’s Governor-General Anourshirvan Mohseni Bandpey said on Thursday he is extending all current restrictive measures until August 21, ISNA reported.
Bandpey said, “Due to the fragile and unstable conditions in Tehran Province, all restrictions, including the remote working of one-third of government employees, will be extended.”
Other extended lockdown disciplines include the closure of indoor swimming pools and gyms, as well as a ban on contact sports and any type of gathering of over 10 people.
Iran’s daily tally of coronavirus infections crossed 2,500, pushing the countrywide total to 338,825, the spokeswoman of Health Ministry, Sima Sadat Lari, said on Friday. Nearly 46% of the freshly identified cases were hospitalized.
“Overnight deaths reached 169, taking the nation’s toll to 19,331,” Lari added.
The National Coronavirus Taskforce is planning to set fines for violators of safety regulations to encourage abidance. Non-essential travels, refusal to wear facemasks and non-adherence to protocols in business places are expected to face a penalty.

Online Election Campaigns

Campaigning for the second round of parliamentary elections will be solely online, the spokesman for Elections Headquarters, Esmaeil Mousavi, announced on Thursday.
The runoff election, which was supposed to be held in mid-April, was postponed to September due to the Covid-19 outbreak.
Mousavi said, “After multiple meetings with health advisors, we decided to hold the election,” adding that the Health Ministry has already devised protocols for safe participation in the upcoming election.
“There will be no campaigning in the nine provinces [where constituencies are located] and electioneering will only take place in cyberspace,” he added.
According to the official, the headquarters will attempt to hold the election in open spaces to halt the spread of the infectious disease. The second round of elections is scheduled for Sept. 11 to select the 12 remaining lawmakers.
In the past 10 days, 100 have been diagnosed with Covid-19 per hour and 7-8 have died.
Some 294,000 have recovered from the viral illness and 3,956 are in critical condition. Iran has carried out 2.8 million tests to detect individuals infected with the novel coronavirus.
The highly-transmitted contagion has infected 21.1 million worldwide and claimed the lives of 759,000.