(Reuters) – Iran imposed a 10-day lockdown across most of the country on Saturday to curb the spread of a fourth wave of the coronavirus pandemic, state media reported.
The lockdown affects 23 of the country’s 31 provinces, Health Ministry spokesman Alireza Raisi said. Businesses, schools, theaters and sports facilities have been forced to close and gatherings are prohibited during the holy month of fasting of Ramadan, which begins Wednesday.
According to the Ministry of Health, the number of coronavirus cases in Iran has passed more than 2 million in the past week with a new daily average of more than 20,000 infections. It has reported more than 64,000 deaths.
“Unfortunately, we entered a fourth wave today,” President Hassan Rouhani said in televised comments. He blamed primarily the variant that first surfaced in the UK and spread to Iran from neighboring Iraq earlier this year.
Other factors included widespread travel, weddings and celebrations during the Iranian New Year holiday that began March 20, he said.
The British variant is now predominant in the country, and 257 cities and towns are on red alert, Raisi said.
Iran was the epicenter of the Middle East pandemic. In February, it closed several border crossings with Iraq in an attempt to stop the spread of the British variant.
The country’s vaccination coverage is also slow.
Tehran says it has received more than 400,000 of the 2 million Sputnik V vaccines on order from Russia and is awaiting delivery of 4.2 million AstraZeneca injections.
It has also received 250,000 doses of China’s Sinopharm vaccine and part of an order of 500,000 doses of COVAXIN from India.
With a population of 83 million, Iran had hoped to get more than 2 million vaccines by March 20 to vaccinate mostly health workers. It is developing at least four local vaccine candidates, one in partnership with Cuba, which are expected to enter production within months.