Friday 26 / April / 2024
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's health has been put under the spotlight again after his top advisor, Dr. Ali Akbar Velayati, on Thursday tested positive for the novel coronavirus, according to Iranian news outlets.
Velayati, a 75-year-old pediatrician, is the President of Tehran's Masih Daneshvari Hospital, Iran's primary center for treating people infected by COVID-19. Hospital officials say Velayati's condition is "improving," according to Radio Farda. He has also reported experiencing mild symptoms.
Last month, he was quoted by state television as saying that the epidemic was not more life-threatening than a wave of the flu.
"Thank God, the Islamic Republic, its Ministry of Health and medical and educational centers have succeeded in defeating the coronavirus," he said.
Leadership under threat
The diagnosis follows a trend in Iran of top officials contracting the virus or having contact with those who do. So far, dozens of Iranian politicians have the virus, with some cases resulting in death.
On March 3, another Khamenei advisor died of coronavirus. Seyed Mohammad Mir-Mohammadi, 71, died at the same hospital that the infected Velayati is the president of. A few days prior, his own mother died after contracting the virus, according to a local newspaper.
Last month, Deputy Health Minister Iraj Harirchi was seen sweating and wiping his forehead on a national television address, in which he denied covering up the scale of the outbreak. He appeared to be in physical discomfort as he addressed reporters, and a few days later publicly announced that he had the virus.
The Vice President of Iran for Women and Family Affairs, Masoumeh Ebtekar, also contracted the virus, and has been spotted on television sitting next to Iranian President Hassan Rohani.
Meanwhile, Esmail Najjar, the chief of Iran's Crisis Management Organization, is infected and is in self-quarantine after several days of treatment in hospital.
Shrine-licking in Qom
The deceased advisor, Mir-Mohammadi, was from Qom, Iran's holy city and the epicenter of the outbreak. Experts believe that the city is seeing such a high number of infections partially because of the practice of kissing shrines, which is seen as a form of healing. The city attracts millions of religious pilgrims every year.
Last month, following a phase of widespread official denial of the dangers of the virus and the first wave of health warnings, some Twitter users in Qom began filming themselves licking holy shrines. "I'm not scared of coronavirus," said one of the Twitter users, before licking and kissing the gates of the Masumeh shrine in Qom.
