TEHRAN — Speaking at the meeting of the National Headquarters for Coronavirus Control on Saturday, President Seyyed Ebrahim Raisi confirmed that 30 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine will be imported.

The announcement by the new president comes as the Covid-19 virus is taking heavy tolls in Iran.

“All public and private sectors, real and legal persons, and individuals must be coordinated and unanimous to control the spread of this dangerous virus,” Raisi stated.

The president said that in order to create this unanimity and coordination, people must be prepared for a comprehensive and decisive confrontation with the coronavirus.

Emphasizing the need to expedite the payment of overdue claims of medical staff and motivate them to continue the selfless activities of the “defenders of health,” Raisi said, “Payment of overdue salaries of medical staff should be one of the priorities of the Planning and Budget Organization. We must also recover and strengthen the medical staff of the universities, the Red Crescent, the armed forces, the volunteer and capable forces of the Basij, the seminarians and the general public volunteers, and we must not allow” the medical staff’s morale to be disrupted.

The president underlined that the next necessary and important step is to speed up the vaccination process.

He also announced the finalization of the import of 30 million doses of vaccine.

Raisi highlighted that it is not solely enough to draft and announce health protocols, adding that if an individual disobeys the protocols and cause people to get sick, he has violated their rights.

The president also stressed the need for stricter surveillance of border traffic and the prevention of illegal traffic, saying, “What has been done so far in this area is necessary, but insufficient, and compliance with health regulations must be closely and effectively monitored."

Raisi considered planning to reduce visits to government organizations as other necessary measures and specified that all bodies or institutions, which are subject to public visits, must draft the necessary plans to reduce visits and provide services in cyberspace not just for these pandemic days, but for the long term, and providing virtual services is a government priority.

The president further referred to the issue of providing special medicines for Covid-19 patients, saying, “After visiting one of the pharmacies on Thursday, it was decided that in the coming days, the required medicines will be distributed between 100 pharmacies in the first phase and up to 300 pharmacies in the second phase in order to avoid queues and gatherings in several pharmacies.

Raisi put an emphasis on monitoring the distribution process in these pharmacies.

On August 11, Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had called on officials to seriously fix the drug distribution system.

"Stop the disruption of the drug distribution network. Medicine must be made available to the public," he highlighted.

The new president also mentioned strengthening and increasing the powers of the heads of provincial headquarters to deal with the coronavirus as one of the other decisions of the Saturday meeting.

“Every individual in the community should first consider himself the addressee of health guidelines and instructions,” the president emphasized.
 
He added that controlling the outbreak of the virus along with the dedicated efforts of the medical staff and public vaccination, require the determination and public cooperation of the people, institutions and agencies so that, God willing, there will be a serious reduction in the number of infected persons and fatalities.

In his August 11 televised address, the Leader suggested that containing the rapidly increasing wave of the Coronavirus is the first and foremost issue of the country.

Placing great emphasis on the fulfillment of duties and the implementation of decisions regarding the Coronavirus pandemic, Ayatollah Khamenei issued important pieces of advice to officials and the people.

"The vaccine, whether imported or domestically produced, must be provided with double effort and in any way possible made available to all people," the Leader said.

"Fortunately, with the production of the domestic vaccine, its foreign import route is also paved, while before that, despite the payment for the vaccine, foreign sellers failed to fulfill their commitments," the Leader said, urging officials to take importation and production of vaccine seriously.

The Leader asked the people to observe the health protocols, saying, "Exactly like in the first days of the Covid-19 pandemic, people must fully follow the instructions and guidelines.”

SA/PA