Poisoned schoolgirls in Qom hospital, Iran. February 5, 2023. 7SOBH
More than a hundred young girls were gassed in schools in Iran on Wednesday, March 1, after a string of similar cases since November have sparked growing emotions in the country, according to local media.
Pupils from seven girls’ schools in the northwestern city of Ardabil became ill from gas fumes in the morning and 108 people were hospitalized, the latter’s department head told the Tasnim press agency.
For context: article reserved for our subscribers In Iran, hundreds of schoolgirls have been victims of malicious poisoning
The general condition of the students, who suffered from breathing difficulties and nausea, is developing positively, he said. The media also reported new cases of poisoning in at least three facilities in Tehran.
In a high school in Tehransar in the west of the capital, students were “poisoned by the projection of a kind of spray,” said the Fars news agency, which quoted the parents of “students”. The same source reported the mobilization of emergency services at the scene.
800 students affected since the end of November
According to estimates by Parliamentary Health Committee spokeswoman Zahra Sheikhi on Wednesday, nearly 800 students have been affected since the first cases of respiratory poisoning in the holy city of Qom at the end of November, including four hundred others in Boroujerd (West). According to the results of toxicological studies presented by the Ministry of Health and quoted by an MP, the toxin used in Qom consisted in particular of nitrogen-based N2 gas used in industry or as an agricultural fertilizer.
Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on Wednesday instructed Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi to “follow up the case as soon as possible” and to “inform” the public about the investigation in order to “assure families’ concerns,” according to the president’s website. In the afternoon, Mr Vahidi told the press that the authorities were still investigating those “possible responsible” for the poisoning, but no arrests had been made. “So far we have no definitive report that a specific substance of a toxic nature was used” to poison students, he added.
The case sparked a wave of anger across the country, with voices decrying the authorities’ silence over the growing number of schools affected. A few schoolgirls were hospitalized briefly, but none were seriously affected.
The Ministry of Health said on Sunday that “certain people” wanted to close “all schools, especially girls’ schools” with these actions. In Iran, where girls make up the majority of students at universities, education is compulsory for everyone, there is a broad consensus.
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