Several girls in Iran have been hospitalised by a wave of poisonous gas attacks targeting them at school, since November last year.
The latest attacks occurred earlier this week, when up to 830 students across 26 schools were sent to hospitals after experiencing a sudden onset of respiratory problems, nausea, dizziness and fatigue. They also reported smelling tangerine or rotten fish before becoming ill.
One official reportedly claimed at least 1,200 students in the Shia Muslim holy city of Qom and Borujerd were poisoned on Tuesday alone.
BBC Persian spoke to a parent whose daughter’s school was attacked by poison on Tuesday.
“My daughter and two of her friends say they heard something like an explosion and immediately afterwards an unpleasant smell – something like burned plastic filled the air,” the parent said.
“They were asked to leave the class and go into the yard. Many of the students started collapsing in the yard. There are kids with asthma and heart problems in my daughter’s class. Ambulances and the police arrived. Kids were given milk by the ambulance staff.”
The gas attacks have mainly targeted girls’ schools over the last three months and are believed to be a reaction against the continuing political tension ignited by the death of Mahsa Amini last September in police custody.
Read the article on Women’s Agenda.