The title picture is from IC photo, and this article is from WeChat public account: Atom Think Tank-Tencent News (ID: AtomThinkTank) , this article belongs to the Atomic Think Tank “Global War Plague Revelation” series, and another How can South Korea control the new crown virus in just 20 days? “ , “Why is Vietnam, with its average medical standard, so impressive in terms of epidemic prevention? “ . Author: Bo, a senior media people, FT Chinese network editorial pages editor.
Editor’s Note
For ordinary people, Iran is only a distant and mysterious existence: In addition to knowing Iran ’s long and powerful Persian history, what I know about Iran after the political change in 1979 is probably a combination of politics, religion, sanctions, Conservative … tags like these, and the imagination of those tags, and the understanding of real Iranian society is often missed.
Since the beginning of this year, the bombing of General Iran ’s Holy City Brigade by the United States and the large-scale outbreak of the new crown virus epidemic have attracted much attention from Iran, a large Middle Eastern country: as of March 3, local timeAccording to the data accumulated at noon on the 0th, the number of confirmed diagnoses in Iran has reached 41,495 and the total deaths have been 2,757. Although the outside world has doubts about the authenticity of the number, Iran is already the epicenter of the worst epidemic in the Middle East.
Using sanctions from the United States for a long time, the level of medical care is hard to say. Can Iran survive the impact of this epidemic?
This issue of the “Atomic Think Tank” focuses on Iran ’s anti-epidemic: Although the two storms between the outbreak and sanctions, Iran ’s means of mitigating the impact are not many, and to a large extent can only be left to fate; but Iran ’s medical system and medical industry are The Middle East is not backward, and its industrial structure is relatively complete. Iranian companies can meet 70% of their medical needs. Under the new crown epidemic, countries have closed their doors, which is not good for small countries and countries that are highly dependent on foreign trade, but it may be an advantage for Iran’s 80 million population, its large domestic market, and its long-term experience in dealing with external restrictions.
Here is the text:
At the end of January, when the new coronavirus began to rag in Wuhan, the Iranian people recorded videos at various Iranian attractions known to Chinese tourists and shouted “Come on, come on in Wuhan.” The landmark Freedom Tower in Tehran lights up ” China red”.
For ordinary Iranians at the time, the new crown virus was still a strange existence far in the sky, as if it would never come to the ancient Persian land.
However, a month later, the new crown virus constituted an outright “survival threat” to Iran. On February 19, Iran’s first case of a new coronavirus patient appeared in Qom, whose origin is a mystery to date, as none of the original infected persons had a history of overseas exposure or travel.
As of 18:00 on March 29, the official confirmed number of new crown virus infections in Iran was 38,309, with 2,640 deaths. However, given the high number of deaths in Italy, Spain and other countries, and the obvious medical level gap between Iran and these two countries, the outside world has always doubted the authenticity of the official figures. Iranian opponents operating abroad have also accused the government of hiding the true epidemic . But this number is already the largest number of infections in the Middle East, and the outbreak is far more severe than in other countries.
And it is striking that New Crown virus has infected quite a number of high-level political figures in Iran: starting with Harwich, deputy minister of health who coughed and sweated at a press conference, including the chairman of the National Security Council, women and women The vice president of family affairs, the former ambassador to the Vatican, and 23 congressmen were infected, many of whom died of serious illness. The virus launched an indiscriminate attack on Iranian society.
Why does Iran become the epicenter of the epidemic in the Middle East?
The rapid spread of Iran ’s new crown epidemic has even become the “epicenter” of the Middle East. In addition to the fierceness of the virus itself, it is also related to the specific social situation of Iran.
First of all, the Iranian government has always said that the new crown virus is equivalent to “large flu”, so that the public need not worry too much. The reason why the virus spread rapidly among senior officials from the beginning is also related to their contempt of threats and insufficient protection.
Second, Iran has been subject to U.S. sanctions for a long time. At the same time, in recent years, domestic governance has been poor, the gap between the rich and the poor has been prominent, unemployment has remained high, and the wealthy class has immigrated a lot. Conservatives and reformers have fierce political struggles. The poor have no time to make a living Taking into account the threat of the virus, the resulting population movement has led to the accelerated spread of the virus, which poses a greater threat to the elderly and those with underlying diseases.
Finally, Iran ushered in the traditional Persian New Year on March 21st. Iranians have a habit of visiting relatives and friends, and traveling with their families during the New Year. Although this year is under the shadow of the epidemic, there are still many people. Not fearing dangerous travel, which undoubtedly makes it more difficult for the Iranian government to prevent and control the epidemic.
Sanctions worsen epidemic
Iran’s medical system and medical industry are not backward in the Middle East, and its industrial structure is relatively complete. Iranian companies can meet 70% of their medical needs, but the rest depends on imports, including finished drugs and raw materials. Nominally, the United States stated that due to humanitarian considerations, its sanctions do not cover drugs, but Iran ’s import of drugs necessarily involves financial transactions, and because of fear of being punished by the United States, almost all international banks are trying to completely clear relations with Iran. This makes it difficult for Iran to import specific categories of medicines. For example, Iran has a severe shortage of drugs to treat cancer.
Under the new crown epidemic, Iran ’s much-needed protective clothing, respirators, and masks have become new problems. With the spread of the global epidemic and the accumulation of epidemic prevention materials in various countries, Iran has a narrow space to import, which also destined its medical system to be more vulnerable to the epidemic.
Of course, the Iranian government has always insisted that it can survive the crisis on its own, and has accused the US of “extreme pressure” policy as the culprit of the current predicament. Regardless of whether this statement constitutes a sufficient excuse and reason, U.S. sanctions are indeed important for Iran’s mirefactor. In 2018, US President Trump announced his withdrawal from the “Iran Nuclear Agreement” and resumed sanctions on Iran. Although the other five parties in the Iran nuclear agreement-Britain, France, Germany, etc.-remain in the framework of the nuclear agreement, the strong sanctions imposed by the United States and the “joint sanctions” against third parties will force other countries to Enterprises are afraid to cooperate with Iran because they are worried about being implicated, so the sanctions are very destructive to the Iranian economy. Especially after the assassination of Suleimani in January this year, which led to a new round of US-Iran conflict, the United States further tightened its ropes against Iran and even threatened to push Iran’s oil exports to zero.
Since the old saying, Iran has called US sanctions an “economic war” against Iran and vowed to resist to the end. In fact, since the establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979, it has been subject to US sanctions, so Iran also has a wealth of “struggle experience” in implementing what it calls “resistance to the economy.” For example: increase the domestic self-sufficiency rate of industrial and consumer goods to reduce imports and save foreign exchange; promote the diversified development of the industry to reduce dependence on oil revenue; deepen economic cooperation with Japan, India, Russia and its neighbors in West Asia and expand their own countries Economic strategy depth, etc.
Iran had seen hope for success. At the beginning of February, Rouhani even said that Iran had maintained a stable economic development in the absence of oil export revenue, implying that the task of resisting the “economic war” of the United States had been basically completed. However, the epidemic broke out a few days later, pouring cold water on Iranians.
The Iranian government has been forced to tighten policy in the face of rising infections and deaths. On March 26, Iranian President Rouhani announced that strict social alienation will be imposed and offenders will be fined about $ 35; those who drive outside the town where they live will be confiscated for a month. Iran’s central bank announced that it would withdraw $ 1 billion from the National Development Fund to support the medical sector and subsidize the unemployed. The Iranian government also provided loans to companies that promised not to fire workers to prevent further unemployment.
However, given the already stretched situation, the Iranian government has limited space to operate. Under U.S. sanctions in the past two years, Iran ’s daily oil export volume has dropped from 2.8 million barrels in 2018 to hundreds of thousands of barrels. Fiscal revenue has plummeted and its economy cannot withstand long-term toss. Iran cannot afford the economic losses caused by long-term closed traffic, nor can it introduce large-scale economic stimulus and national economic subsidy policies like Western countries. If the economy is stopped for a long time due to the control of the epidemic, it may not only induce social instability, but also endanger the survival of the Iranian regime itself.
So Iran ’s strategy is to implement stricter regulations within a month and see if it can be used to curb the outbreak. If this is not the case, policy balances mayGradually tilt towards deregulation and promote economic growth.
The weakness of external sanctions response strategies
For Iran, the epidemic was not only a public health crisis, but also exposed the weaknesses of its sanctions response strategy. Previously, in the context of economic and trade restrictions and financing constraints with the West, Iran set its sights on regional markets, seeking to boost domestic output in petrochemical, steel, cement, agriculture, and manufacturing industries and increase exports of non-petroleum products, at least to establish its The industrial hegemony in the regional market has a certain strength to counter sanctions and deal with the United States.
An important reason why the Iranian economy has not been completely killed has always been that, although the United States sanctions have a great deterrent effect on the Iranian trading partners such as the European Union, the United States is unable to cut off the economic and trade links between Iran and its neighbors. Although the economic development level of Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan and other neighboring countries is not high, after all, it provides Iran with a first-line survival space, and provides Iran with opportunities to bypass US sanctions and bypass oil exports. By setting up offices and registered companies in neighboring countries, and cash transactions, Iran can quietly develop trade, export goods, and obtain precious foreign exchange in the gaps in the US sanctions network.
However, after Iran became the “source of infection” for the new crown of West Asia epidemic, neighboring countries closed their borders with Iran and stopped navigation in order to protect themselves. Currently, only Qatar Airways maintains routes with Iran. This further isolates Iran, exports of oil and other products have been greatly compressed, and it has been difficult to implement the strategy of seeking a limited international survival line.
In the months following Trump’s unilateral withdrawal from the nuclear agreement in 2018, Iranian rials have depreciated by more than 50%, inflation has soared to more than 40%, and foreign companies have evacuated; the IMF estimates that the Iranian economy in 2019 Down 9.5%. The economic damage of the new crown epidemic may be more serious than the US sanctions. Reduced domestic economic activity for epidemic prevention, disruption in relations with neighboring countries, and the deterioration of the overall international trade environment all mean that Iran’s economy may fall into a greater recession this year.
Unfortunately, for the first time in history, Iran turned to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for assistance for $ 5 billion in emergency assistance. But Iran’s appeal is likely to be blocked by the United States. The European Union has announced that it will provide 20 million euros in humanitarian aid to Iran, but this is clearly a far cry from Iran ’s need for anti-epidemic funding.
Iran is not too fragile
However, it cannot be said that under the double blow of the epidemic and sanctions, the Iranian authorities will certainly not survive. Although the current situation is hectic, Iran has a certain ability to withstand shocks. Iran has a population of 80 million, and its agricultural output is not only self-sufficient, it also has the capacity to export. There is also no report of a shortage of domestic commodities in Iran at present-because Iran has already increased its reserves of grain and other consumer goods in response to the possible impact of US sanctions.
Iran’s crude oil and natural gas reserves rank first in the world. As long as domestic oil prices can be kept low and the cost of living of residents will not rise rapidly, there will be no drastic social unrest.
At the same time, the impact of US sanctions on Iran will have a diminishing marginal effect. As Iran gradually becomes accustomed to sanctions and adjusts its own response strategy, its harm to the Iranian economy will gradually weaken. Just two years after the current round of sanctions, Iran’s “adaptability” may still be improving.
In fact, external sanctions have forced Iran to increase the diversification of its industry, rather than relying too much on oil as Saudi Arabia, which is conducive to the long-term health of its economic structure.
For Iranian companies, the withdrawal of foreign capital and the stagnation of imports mean less competition, which helps them to take the opportunity to expand their domestic market share and strengthen themselves. Under the new crown epidemic, countries have closed their doors, which is not good for small countries and countries that are highly dependent on foreign trade. However, Iran’s 80 million population, large domestic market, and long-term experience in dealing with external restrictions may become an advantage.
Iran’s population structure is also an objective advantage, with young people under 29 accounting for 54.9% of the total population. Recently, the term “herd immunity” in Britain has been ridiculed by network groups, but the “herd immunity” phenomenon exists objectively in a scientific sense. Because most of the new coronaviruses are mild, they mainly threaten the elderly and people with basic diseases, and the young people are relatively resistant. Therefore, after a considerable proportion of the population is infected and immune is generated, the virus transmission speed will be greatly reduced. The epidemic may even disappear. Although the process of “herd immunity” is a bit cruel, a high percentage of young people in Iran can indeed play a certain shield role.
At the same time, although U.S. economic sanctions are still in place, the U.S. military threat to Iran will be greatly reduced in the future. Judging from the development trend of the U.S. new crown epidemic, the United States will become the “epicenter” of this global epidemic, and the peak period of the epidemic may continue for one or two months; the epidemic will also cause fierce bipartisan struggle in the United States.Facing a challenging 2020, this will consume his main energy. After a fierce US-Iraq confrontation in January, this meant a respite for Iran; the reduction in the demand for military expenditures could also help it make its way to ease the domestic epidemic and stabilize the economy.
Under the two storms of the epidemic and sanctions, Iran has few ways to mitigate the impact. But if fate visits Iran, it may also see the natural ebb or even disappear of the epidemic. If Democrats in the United States win the general election at the end of the year, Iranians will be even more pleased. The Democrats will almost certainly reverse Trump’s Iran policy and return to the Iran nuclear agreement.
Whether it is rainstorm destroying the city or “the sun is always after the storm”, everything has to wait for the time to announce the answer.
This article comes from WeChat public account: Atom Think Tank-Tencent News (ID: AtomThinkTank) , author: Bo