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Iranwire – The wife of the former Shah of Iran, Farah Pahlavi, has penned an open letter to the head of the World Health Organization requesting the allocation of some US-donated Covid-19 vaccines to the Iranian people.
In the letter, which was published on Twitter, Farah Pahlavi advised Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus that the Iranian government had “delayed public vaccination, leaving a vast unvaccinated majority exposed to Covid-19”.
Fewer than one percent of Iran’s population has received a full two doses of vaccine and with the spread of the Delta and Beta variants, there are fears the country may be on the verge of a “fourth wave” of infection.
US President Joe Biden recently announced that the country would donate some 20 million doses of US-authorized vaccines, including Pfizer and Moderna, to poor and needy countries.
“I am hopeful,” Farah Pahlavi wrote, “that a portion of this shipment, with your help and under the aegis of the World Health Organization, may also be allocated to my country, Iran.”
In early January Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei banned the importation of US- and British-made vaccines, hampering the slow vaccine procurement process in Iran. Officials have sought to get around the ban by bringing in doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine made in India.
According to the Iranian Ministry of Health’s latest announcements, just 4.1 million Iranians have received a first dose of vaccine out of a population of more than 82 million. Fewer than 540,000 have received their second dose.
