Authorities in Iran are being urged to permit specialist medical care for Narges Mohammadi after her health took a critical turn and she was moved from a prison medical unit to a hospital, according to statements from a foundation run by her family and the Norwegian Nobel Committee.
Mohammadi, who is in her 50s and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize while incarcerated for her work campaigning for women’s rights and the abolition of the death penalty, was transferred on Friday following what her family’s foundation described as a catastrophic decline in health. The foundation reported two episodes of complete loss of consciousness and a severe cardiac crisis.
The Narges Mohammadi Foundation said the move to hospital was "an unavoidable necessity after prison doctors determined her condition could not be managed on-site." In a subsequent update, the foundation said she remained in an unstable condition and was receiving oxygen. It called for her to be moved to a hospital in Tehran for further tests and specialised treatment.
Her family has said she suffered a suspected heart attack in late March. They also report that Mohammadi fainted on Friday morning after several days of dangerously high blood pressure and severe nausea. After multiple bouts of vomiting, she lost consciousness and was transferred to the prison medical unit for emergency intravenous fluids, the foundation said.
Mohammadi has previously undergone three angioplasty procedures, the foundation added, and her family described her situation as involving a "direct and immediate" threat to her right to life. They repeated their appeal for all charges against her to be dropped and for sentences imposed in relation to her peaceful human rights work to be annulled unconditionally.
"Iranian authorities must release Mohammadi to her dedicated medical team so she can urgently receive treatment as her life is at risk," said Joergen Watne Frydnes, chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee. He added that she "is imprisoned solely for her peaceful human rights work. Her life is now in the hands of the Iranian authorities."
The foundation said Mohammadi was sentenced to a new prison term of seven and a half years in February. Her arrest in December followed her public denunciation of the death of a lawyer, Khosrow Alikordi. Prosecutor Hasan Hematifar said at the time that she had made provocative remarks at Alikordi’s memorial ceremony.
The foundation’s public summaries of events include medical and legal details from inside the prison medical unit and from family communications. The foundation has made clear requests for transfer and for judicial action to be reversed with respect to convictions and sentences related to her activism.
Mohammadi’s supporters and the Nobel Committee have called attention to the urgency of her medical needs and have framed her situation as one where the state’s response to requests for specialist care will be decisive. The foundation’s description of repeated vomiting, severe nausea and dangerously high blood pressure, followed by loss of consciousness, underlines the medical concerns the family and committee have expressed.
At present, there is no independent verification of the medical details released by the foundation and the committee. Those updates describe an activist with a serious cardiac event history and multiple recent procedures, whose condition the family describes as unstable and in need of specialist attention.
Contextual note: The foundation’s statement and the Norwegian Nobel Committee’s appeal reflect calls for immediate medical transfer and for the reversal of sentences imposed for Mohammadi’s peaceful human rights activities. The foundation has requested that all charges be dropped and that her sentences be unconditionally annulled.