Medics describe overwhelmed hospitals as Iran protests continue

As protests in Iran continue and Iranian authorities issued coordinated warnings to protesters, a doctor and medic at two hospitals told the BBC their facilities were overwhelmed with injuries.

One doctor said a Tehran eye hospital had gone into crisis mode, while the BBC also obtained a message from a medic in another hospital saying it did not have enough surgeons to cope with the influx of patients.

On Friday, US President Donald Trump said Iran was in “big trouble” and warned “you better not start shooting because we’ll start shooting too”.

Iran in a letter to the UN Security Council blamed the US for turning the protests into what it called “violent subversive acts and widespread vandalism”.

Anti-government protests, which continued on Friday, have taken place in dozens of locations, with two human rights groups reporting at least 50 protesters have been killed.

The BBC and most other international news organisations are barred from reporting inside Iran, and the country has been under a near-total internet blackout since Thursday evening, making obtaining and verifying information difficult.

A doctor from Iran, who contacted the BBC via Starlink satellite internet on Friday night, said Farabi Hospital, Tehran’s main eye specialist centre, had gone into crisis mode, with emergency services overwhelmed.

Non-urgent admissions and surgeries were said to have been suspended, and staff called in to deal with emergency cases.

The BBC also obtained a video and audio message from a medic in a hospital in the south-west city of Shiraz on Thursday. The medic said large numbers of injured people were being brought in, and the hospital did not have enough surgeons to cope with the influx. He claimed many of the wounded had gunshot injuries to the head and eyes.

A health worker at another hospital in Tehran also told the BBC that their patients included gunshot wound victims.

Since protests began on 28 December, at least 51 protesters, including seven children, and 21 security personnel have been killed, according to the US-based Human Rights Activist News Agency (HRANA). More than 2,311 individuals have also been arrested, the group reported.

The Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHRNGO) said at least 51 protesters, including nine children, had been killed.

BBC Persian has verified the identities of 26 killed protesters, including five children.

Iranian police maintained that no one was killed over Friday night in Tehran, though they said 26 buildings were set on fire, with damage to property very extensive.

United Nations Secretary General spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric said the UN was very disturbed by the loss of life.

“People anywhere in the world have a right to demonstrate peacefully, and governments have a responsibility to protect that right and to ensure that that right is respected,” he said.

French President Emmanuel Macron, UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz released a joint statement that said: “The Iranian authorities have the responsibility to protect their own population and must allow for the freedom of expression and peaceful assembly without fear of reprisal.”

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei remained defiant in a televised address on Friday, saying: “The Islamic Republic came to power through the blood of several hundred thousand honourable people and it will not back down in the face of those who deny this.”

Later, in remarks made to a gathering of supporters and broadcast on state television, Khamenei reiterated the message, saying Iran “will not shirk from dealing with destructive elements”.

By contrast, the son of Iran’s last shah, Reza Pahlavi, described the protests on Friday as “magnificent” and urged Iranians to stage further targeted protests over the weekend.

“Our goal is no longer just to take to the streets. The goal is to prepare to seize and hold city centres,” Pahlavi said in a video message on social media.

Pahlavi, who is based in the US, said he was preparing to return to the country.

Former British ambassador to Iran, Sir Simon Gass, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme “we really shouldn’t get too ahead of ourselves” when discussing regime change.

He said the lack of organised opposition within Iran means that people do not have anyone to coalesce around who presents an alternative to the regime as it stands.

He added, however, that these protests are different to previous ones, which are bringing in “a much wider movement of protesters than we’ve tended to see in the past”, triggered by ordinary people finding it “almost impossible to make ends meet because of the disaster to the economy”.

At the White House on Friday, Trump said his administration was watching the situation in Iran carefully.

“It looks to me that the people are taking over certain cities that nobody thought were really possible just a few weeks ago,” he said.

He echoed earlier warnings to Iran’s leadership, saying: “We will be hitting them very hard where it hurts.” He added that any US involvement did not mean “boots on the ground”.

On Thursday, Trump said he would “hit them very hard” if they “start killing people”.

Later on Friday, the US said Iran’s foreign minister was “delusional” after he accused Israel and Washington of fuelling the protests.

“This statement reflects a delusional attempt to deflect from the massive challenges the Iranian regime faces at home,” a US State Department spokesperson said in response to the comments by Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.

Early on Saturday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio posted on X: “The United States supports the brave people of Iran.”

Iranian political activist Taghi Rahmani, who spent 14 years in prison in Iran and whose wife, Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammadi, was re-arrested in December, told the Today programme he was dubious of American support.

“We believe foreign intervention will make the opposition dependent,” he said. “When the opposition is dependent, you have to sacrifice national interests for that government. This will not be acceptable for the Iranian people.”

The Iranian security and judicial authorities had issued a series of coordinated warnings to protesters on Friday, hardening their rhetoric and echoing an earlier message of “no leniency” by Iran’s top security body, the Supreme National Security Council.

Iran’s National Security Council said “decisive and necessary legal action will be taken” against protesters, which it described as “armed vandals”.

The intelligence arm of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) said it would not tolerate what it described as “terrorist acts”, asserting that it would continue its operations “until the complete defeat of the enemy’s plan”.

Additional reporting by Soroush Negahdari