The Iranian Health Minister Saeid Namaki made the comments on the sidelines of a meeting with managers and health ministers of the Eastern Mediterranean countries which was held on Wednesday via videoconferencing.
Namaki said that after the coronavirus invasion, all countries got into trouble and the structure of the World Health Organization was not ready for the all-out invasion.
He also said the issue of inequality among rich and poor countries in dealing with the pandemic was one of the issues discussed during today's meeting, adding that unilateral and cruel economic sanctions against Iran put a lot of pressure on Iran in the fight against the virus.
The Iranian health minister also pointed out that while the ongoing fourth wave of Covid-19 pandemic that the UK variant of the virus is blamed for is in decline, the new cases infected with newly-emerged Indian and South African variants of the virus are emerging across Iran.
Namaki went on to say that 38 suspected cases infected with the South African variant of coronavirus and 13 cases infected with the Indian variant have been so far been reported in Iran.
He called on the people to abide by the health guidelines to avoid another deadly wave of the spread of the virus.
KI/TSN2497568