WANA (May 22) – Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei issued a strongly-worded statement on X (formerly Twitter), citing a recent report by the prestigious medical journal The Lancet to condemn recent airstrikes that damaged the Pasteur Institute of Iran.

 

Baghaei emphasized that the destruction of the historic scientific facility poses a severe threat to both national and regional public health safety.

 

The full text of the statement reads as follows:

“The Lancet, a world-leading medical journal, has warned that damage to the Pasteur Institute of Iran, as the result of U.S./Israeli attacks, threatens regional health security. According to The Lancet, ‘The Pasteur Institute of Iran has been a pillar of the country’s public health system for more than a century.

 

This institute has provided key public health infrastructure on multiple fronts, including vaccine development and production, national reference laboratory services, diagnostics, and genomic surveillance for infectious diseases, including SARS-CoV-2, cholera, rabies, measles, tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, and viral hepatitis.

 

The loss of the institute is not merely symbolic; it represents a real, immediate, and dangerous threat to public health. […] This is not solely a national issue; regional health security is also at risk.’

 

Attacking a century-old scientific and public health institution is not merely an attack on a building; it is an assault on people’s right to health, science, and life.

 

The American-Israeli deliberate attack on the Pasteur Institute of Iran was a flagrant war crime. The perpetrators must be held accountable.”