Health Impact
While the Iran sanctions have hurt ordinary Iranians for decades, the Trump administration's 2018 withdrawal from the "Iran deal" (JCPOA) and its subsequent policy of “maximum pressure” has resulted in extremely harsh living conditions and death for for Iranians, especially the most vulnerable segments of the Iranian population. In November 2020 alone, 10,000 Iranians died from Covid-19, largely because the sanctions have made access to necessary medical equipment and life-saving medicine extremely difficult in Iran. The sanctions have also restricted the Iranian state's ability to purchase the COVID-19 vaccine. According to official numbers, over 1.1 million Coronavirus cases and 52,883 Corona-related deaths have been.reported in Iran. This means that 1.321% of the Iranian population (in comparison to 4.95% of the U.S. population) has contracted the virus. Over 5% of the infected people have died in Iran, a percentage that far exceeds 1.82% of deaths of Covid-19 infected people in the U.S. These figures reveal the high rate of Corona-related deaths, despite the lower rate of overall infection. The sanctions coupled with the Iranian state’s mishandling of the pandemic are responsible for the disproportionate deaths in Iran.
