On Sunday, Younes Panahi, an Iranian deputy health minister said that “some people” were poisoning schoolgirls in the holy city of Qom intending to shut down education for girls. 

The IRNA state news agency quoted Panahi, and said, “After the poisoning of several students in Qom schools, it was found that some people wanted all schools, especially girls’ schools, to be closed.”

Recognising the mysterious wave of illnesses, the authorities launched an investigation, but no evidence of poison was found. The hospitalisations have prompted public anger, with the Iranians accusing the government of carelessness and negligence. There have been no arrests linked to the poisonings yet. 

In recent months, hundreds of schoolgirls, mainly from Qom, south of Tehran, have fallen sick and scores have been hospitalised for cases of respiratory poisoning. Following the wave of illnesses in schools, parents have refused to send their children to school. 

Recently, Nafiseh Moradi, a researcher of Islamic studies at Al Zahra University, an all-female public university in Tehran, expressed that it was suspicious that most girls have fallen ill with similar symptoms, with visible segregation by gender. 

In the first incident, 18 schoolgirls in Qom were taken to a hospital after complaining of symptoms that included nausea, headaches, coughing, breathing difficulties, heart palpitations, and numbness and pain in their hands or legs.

Dozens have received treatment, but authorities haven’t yet been able to determine the cause of the mysterious wave of sickness, despite conducting toxicology tests. 

On February 22, 15 schoolgirls were transferred to a hospital in Qom, the Qom News outlet reported. Some suspect that religious extremists, in a bid to create fear and prevent girls from attending school, could be behind the mysterious wave of illnesses.