Two die of coronavirus in Iran, first fatalities in Middle East

Two elderly people have died in Iran after testing positive for the new coronavirus, according to health officials.

The deaths on Wednesday were the outbreak's first fatalities in the Middle East.

"Two elderly people have died due to coronavirus in the city of Qom, south of Tehran," Alireza Vahabzadeh, an adviser to Iran's health minister, told Al Jazeera on Wednesday.

"The two victims had suffered acute lung infections due to their infection with the coronavirus," he added.

Earlier in the day, Kianoush Jahanpour, spokesman for Iran's ministry of health, said the two people had tested positive for the virus in preliminary results and died due to immune deficiencies and old age.

There was no immediate information about the gender and the exact age of the victims.

COVID-19, as the virus is officially known, was first detected in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late December. It has since killed more than 2,000 people in mainland China and infected more than 75,000 globally. The two victims in Iran were the country's first cases and only the seventh and eighth death caused by the virus outside mainland China.

Last month, the United Arab Emirates was the first country in the Middle East to report cases of the new coronavirus.