Iranian interior minister urges caution against 6th wave of Covid

He added that Covid-related restrictions will remain in place until all concerns are dispelled. 

Vahidi noted that decision to remove them including the nigh-time driving ban must be taken by the National Covid Taskforce. 

The Iranian interior minister also spoke of the reopening of schools, saying classes will be held both in-person and online. 

Meanwhile, the Covid vaccination process is continuing in Iran at full speed. According to the Tuesday announcement of the Health Ministry, Iranian healthcare centers administered 1,018,659 doses of vaccine to people over the past 24 hours. So far, 53,102,837 people have received the first dose of Covid vaccine and 36,054,893 have been fully inoculated. 

Some 100 thousand people have also received the booster shot, the third dose of Covid vaccine. 

Despite the accelerating vaccination campaign, Covid is still taking a toll of people in Iran. The disease has killed 160 more Iranians over the past 24 hours. The fatalities push the number of those killed so far since the start of the Pandemic to 126,616. 

The daily death toll now is way lower than that during the heyday of the fifth wave of Covid in Iran when around 700 died in a single day. The downward trend in Covid deaths, infections and hospitalizations has held over the past couple of months thanks to the vaccination process.