KRG proposes plan to keep coronavirus out of Kurdistan Region

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The Kurdistan Regional Government’s (KRG) Ministry of Health put into motion several new precautionary measures and recommendations with the aim of preventing the spread of the coronavirus from Iran to the Kurdistan Region. 

Although there have been no known cases of the disease in Iraq or the Kurdistan Region, officials from Iran said Thursday that three people there had been newly-infected, just a day after they had announced that two others had died in the Iranian city of Qom. According to local media, nine deaths in total have occurred in Iran. 

According to the latest figures by the World Health Organization (WHO), the contagious COV-19 disease that Chinese health authorities first became aware of in late December in the seaside city of Wuhan has so far killed over 2,000 people in China and has infected a total of more than 75,000 worldwide.

The first part of the plan announced Thursday was an official request to the KRG’s Ministry of Interior “to prevent Iranian citizens from entering the Kurdistan Region through all its borders ports, both official and unofficial, until further notice, with the exception of diplomatic envoys provided they receive a medical inspection upon arrival.” 

It added, “This decision does not include Kurdistan Region citizens who are currently in Iran. They must, however, abide by the regulations of the Ministry of Health which include a 14-day period of quarantine and observation,” before they will be permitted to move freely.

The third recommendation was that the KRG should “prevent all Kurdistan Region citizens and Iraqi citizens from traveling to the Islamic Republic of Iran until further notice.” 

Later in the day, Baghdad deployed medical teams to all Iranian border crossings that are tasked with helping to prevent anyone infected from entering the country's cities as a result of international travel from its eastern neighbor

Read More: Iraq deploys health teams at Iran borders to block coronavirus from

Earlier on Thursday, KRG’s spokesperson Jutyar Adil announced that regional Prime Minister Masorur Barzani approved an emergency budget to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

Health Ministry spokesperson Mohammed Qadir explained that more than 100,000 posters have been prepared in the Kurdish, English, and Arabic languages that include instruction on how the public can protect itself from the virus to be hung in schools and public places.

“The Ministry of Health will specify the proper mechanism of spending the emergency budget which has been provided to stop the prevention of coronavirus,” added Qadir. 

The KRG is aiming to strengthen regulations at its border-crossings and airports and to establish modern medical inspection points to prevent those who carry the virus to enter the Kurdistan Region.

The Iraqi Ministry of Transportation also announced that it was suspending all flights between Iraq and Iran.   

Editing by John J. Catherine