Iranian state TV reports district mayor infected with coronavirus, official denies

An Iranian official had been tested positive for coronavirus, the Islamic country’s state TV reported on Saturday. According to the report, Morteza Rahmanzadeh, the mayor of district 13 of capital Tehran was hospitalised after showing coronavirus symptoms on Friday. However, soon after state TV broadcasted its reports, an Iranian news agency took to Twitter to announce that the Director of Public Relations for district 13 has denied the reports of Rahmanzadeh contracting the virus adding that he was in a good health.

28 confirmed case of the virus

This comes as Iran reported 28 confirmed cases of the deadly virus, out of which five have already died. Recently, the World Health Organisation expressed its concern about the rising number of coronavirus cases in Iran.WHO has reportedly supplied testing kits to Iran. In addition, they continue to provide further support in the coming days & weeks, a news agency reported.

Read: Iran Reports Another Death, 10 New Cases Of New Coronavirus

 According to international media reports, WHO said that although the total number of positive cases outside China remains relatively small, the health organisation is concerned about those people who had no clear epidemiological link, such as travel history to China or contact with a confirmed case but still got infected. 

Read: Iran Now Says 5 Dead Out Of 28 Infected With New Coronavirus

Meanwhile, the spokesman of the Iranian health ministry, Kianoush Jahanpour, said the newly detected cases are all linked with the city of Qom where the first two elderly patients died earlier. Jahanpour said the new cases were either from Qom or had visited the city recently. He said four of them are hospitalized in the capital, Tehran, and two in the northern province of Gilan. Concerns over the spread of the virus, which originated in central China, prompted authorities in Iran to close all schools and Shiite seminaries in Qom. Meanwhile, the deadly virus has reportedly infected over 77,700 people globally and killed nearly 2,300 with all but 15 deaths outside mainland China. 

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