Thousands of residents of Khuzestan have sought hospital treatment due to worsening air pollution in the southern Iranian province.

The Khuzestan capital Ahwaz, with a population of five million, was recently named as the world’s most polluted city by the World Health Organisation.

A health official at Ahwaz university said in the city alone, 16,344 people needed medical treatment for the effects of acid rain.

More than 50 people were also hospitalized with respiratory problems in Ahwaz when air pollution levels spiked on November 5.

Across Iran, air pollution is now the third worst in the world, according to the WHO. The regime’s health ministry also admitted in March that environmental pollution kills around 80,000 people a year in Iran, which equates to 21 per cent of the country’s annual death toll.

In a report by the state-run Fars News Agency on February 27, the ministry’s head of environmental health Kazem Naddafi said: “Iran will have the highest health levels in the region by 2025.”

via Iran: Thousands in hospital as air pollution peaks in Khuzestan.