Iran has seen nearly three times the coronavirus fatalities that state officials are reporting, according to a new report from the BBC.
Using official state health data leaked by an anonymous source, the BBC found that some 42,000 Iranians suffering symptoms of COVID-19 had died as of July 20, compared to the 14,405 cases the Iranian Health Ministry reported for the same period.
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The BBC probe also found that the number of confirmed carriers (451,024) was much larger than the officially-reported 278,827. A second wave hit Iran hard, and in the past few weeks, the nation has seen a sharp rise in the number of confirmed COVID cases within its borders.
According to the medical data obtained by the BBC, the first recorded coronavirus death in Iran occurred on Jan. 22, but it took 28 before any deaths from the virus were reported, in which time the death toll in Iran rose to 52.
Since the start of the coronavirus epidemic in Iran, many people have expressed doubt about the morbidity and mortality figures put out by the regime. In April, a report from Iran's parliament said the national death toll was likely nearly double the officially reported figures. Given insufficient testing, the report said the number of people infected at the time was probably "eight to 10 times" higher than the reported figures.
Discrepancies have been found between what the national government reported and the numbers supplied by local or district authorities. The information reported by the BBC indicated that the Iranian authorities were intentionally downplaying the country's true COVID death toll, even though its health care system has exact figures on the number of ill, dead, and recovered.
According to the leaked Iranian data, Tehran has seen the most deaths from coronavirus in Iran: 8,120. The city of Qom, the initial epicenter of the COVID outbreak in the country, has seen 1,149 deaths from the virus, or one out of every 1,000 residents.
The data also noted that 1,916 of the COVID deaths in Iran were foreign citizens.
The source told the BBC that he or she had leaked the data in an attempt to "shed light on truth" and put a stop to the epidemic being used for "political games."
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