Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company starts disinfecting buses on February 21, 2020 as a prevention measure to curb the spread of the new coronavirus in Tehran. (Photo by ISNA)

Iran�s Health Ministry has confirmed two more deaths among 13 new cases of coronavirus, putting the total number of deaths so far in the country at four.

Kianoush Jahanpour, the head of public relations and information center of the Iranian Ministry of Health, said on Friday that most of the cases are either residents in the holy city of Qom or people who have traveled to Qom in recent days and weeks.

He added that the new cases comprised seven in Qom, four in the capital Tehran and two in the northern province of Gilan. Unfortunately two of them have lost their lives.

The outbreak of coronavirus - known as COVID-19 - in Iran first occurred on February 19, when health authorities in Qom confirmed the death of two elderly people as a result of a first incidence of the infection in the country.

Jahanpour added that two people suspected of carrying the virus had been quarantined in the city of Babol, the northern province of Mazandaran, but the test results have not been announced yet.

Meanwhile, in a post on his Twitter account, Jahanpour said Iran received the fourth shipment of medical kits used for the detection of COVID-19 by Representative of the World Health Organization (WHO) in Iran Christoph Hamelmann via Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, on Friday.

China on the same day raised the death toll to 2,236, most of them in the province of Hubei, where the virus was first detected. More than 75,000 have now been infected in China and over 1,100 abroad.

SOURCE: PRESS TV