Instruments
- Is the government doing enough to contain the Corona-virus?
- Why is the population not respecting the measures implemented to reduce the spread?
- Are the given numbers from the authorities real?
Focus Group
Greece – Male 1
Iran – Male 2
Iran – Female 1
Iran – Female 2
Iran – Female 3
Online meeting via Skype: April 4th 2020, 3pm Greece time. 4:30pm Iran time.
I am conducting this focus group with the consent of all participants.
Instrument: Is the government doing enough to contain the virus?
Female 1: The government has started to take severe measures to control the virus. Even placed control check points to restrict unnecessary movement. They have banned all internal travelling. They have closed most entertainment centers like shopping malls, and cinemas. It’s the people that aren’t listening and continuing their daily activities.
Me: So you say that the government is doing enough?
Female 1: Yes totally.
Male 2: I agree that right now the government has taken certain measures, but it’s too late. They didn’t take the measures when they should have. It was all political and economic benefits that prevented them to ignore the virus, and now it’s out of control. They lied about the numbers. They knew everything. They shouldn’t be taken for granted now, they caused this. They are the ones to blame. I can’t say Rohani (President of Iran) is to blame, he’s under the control of the hard-liners and the supreme leader. If it was in his hands, he would have taken the necessary measures on time.
Male 1: I agree with Male 2 in some points. The government didn’t stop the elections which was one of the reasons the virus got out of control. They needed the people to show up for the elections. They kept all religious centers open to the public. People were travelling from other cities to Qom, and then back to their own city. The blame is on the government. Even right now, everything is being controlled by the “Sepah” (revolutionary guards of the Islamic Republic). Medical experts are controlling nothing. However, I disagree about Rohani. He and the rest of the government are the same. They are all one. You can’t separate them from one another. Rohani himself said that we will not quarantine cities, only individuals. His deputy health minister said that quarantine belongs to the Stone Age, not the modern time….
Female 2: I just don’t think the government could have done anything earlier. It was near the New Year celebrations. It’s impossible to convince people to stay home. They have to go visit their families this time of the year. So either way even if the government were to act earlier, the general population would act irresponsibly. Iran is to blame as a whole, the government and the population.
Me: The government in Iran is a dictator. They achieve everything through force. You think if they would have imposed a lockdown from the beginning, they couldn’t control the people?
Female 2: Not completely at least. They could have controlled a small part of the population.
Me: So you can’t really point out to who is responsible for this outbreak? You say the people and the government.
Female 2: Exactly.
Female 3: As I’m working as a nurse, so I can see what was wrong and right. The reality is the lies of the government that lead to this outbreak. There is no need for further discussion. We are suffering as a nation because of the ruling dictatorship. Nothing else is to blame. Not the people, not the New Year celebration, not the sanctions. The government is responsible for this disaster. Period.
Instrument: Why is the population not respecting the measures implemented to reduce the spread?
Female 2: As I said earlier, it’s the timing of the virus, it was the anniversary of the regime coming into power, after that it was the Iranian New Years. It’s also the economy that can’t allow people to stay home. Most people have to go out to bring food home that night. They have no sort of pension or allowance to support them. So they won’t respect the measures. They have no other option.
Me: When you say “Most people have to go out to bring food home that night”, you mean they work on a daily base and earn what they sell? Right? So they need to work daily to buy food for the family right?
Female 2: Yes. You can’t really find people with work contracts in Iran. Most people earn for the job they do daily. And the prices are very high. The inflation is high. Everything.
Female 1: Exactly as Female 2 said, it’s for several reasons that aren’t respecting the measures to control the virus. Our average age is below 30, we have a lot of young people in Iran. It’s hard to control these youth. You can’t tell them to stay home. You can’t restrict them very easily. Even culturally, the New Year’s is the time to visit others. Nobody stayed home this year. Everyone did their routine celebrations with friends and family.
Me: When you say nobody stayed home, do you know this as a fact, or based on what you saw?
Female 1: Based on what I saw and the news.
Male 1: I think we shouldn’t look at it culturally or age wise, every country has a problem right now trying to make people stay home. Even here right now in Greece, with strict measures and fines, people are still violating them. I can’t really understand Greece. But as an Iranian, I can understand the society in Iran. The case in Iran is political. It’s distrust. The majority don’t trust the government.
Me: Distrust in the government? That’s why they’re not following orders on Corona measures? What do you mean?
Male 1: People are dissatisfied with the regime. If the regime says the sky is blue, people would say it’s not. So when the government says to respect measures, people don’t, and they say why doesn’t the government do more? Why did they let it happen in the first place? This is the response of people. So we have to look at this issue deeper. It’s not the traditions that makes people not respect the measures, it’s the mistrust they have in the regime.
Female 3: From what I’m seeing in the hospitals, when we have a patient in critical condition, usually the relatives and family members also visit the hospital because they feel scared of the symptoms they’re also experiencing. Meaning usually families as whole have got the virus. I think it’s the time and cultures which lead to a lot of visits between families for the New Year’s. They couldn’t prevent themselves from visiting others. As if it is taboo to not go to your relatives house for the New Year’s. So I think it’s mainly the timing that people couldn’t respect the measures.
Me: So another factor can be the time of the virus spread?
Female 3: From what I understand, yes.
Male 2: I think the government didn’t do enough to implement the measures. They didn’t close anything when they should have. So people didn’t take it serious. Even right now, we see that older people aren’t coming outside, not even for shopping, but the youth? They’re still out. Go to Park “Melat” right now, there are hundreds gathered selling drugs and other things. Who’s controlling them? No one. Forget the New Year’s things… The government should be outside restricting people. They’re not. They have closed stores, ok, but what else? This government cannot manage a country of 80 million.
Instrument: Are the given numbers from the authorities real?
Female 3: When I was first called to work with the quarantined patients of Corona, my supervisor warned me that no information leaves this hospital. Meaning what I saw should not be spoken about outside. Not the number of patients, the seriousness of the virus, or anything. I knew from the beginning of February that the virus had spread in Iran. Of course the numbers are a lie. It’s ten times worse than this. The government has made mass graves for the fatalities. They’re being buried outside of Qom, without anyone knowing. I know a colleague who was arrested for posting a picture of a patient in quarantine on her Instagram. Nobody knows the truth yet, but I think sooner or later everything will be exposed.
Female 2: I don’t think any country can give exact numbers. Not everyone can be checked. So how could you know the real numbers? In a period where there is also a presence of the flu, cold, etc. With 80 million people, recording the numbers is not easy to do. So yes, I do believe that the numbers are not exact, but it is the same in every country.
Male 1: I don’t think we’re talking about the numbers that we don’t know of, the question is the numbers that we are aware of. Has the government told the truth from the stats that they have? Or decreased the value? This is the question. Of course no country can be 100 percent right. But are they telling the truth from the stats they have? Which I think they’re not. In Iran, they lied from the beginning, one health official said we mistook it for the flu, remember? If they would have told you the number from the beginning of February, would you have gone out? The government lies about everything. That’s what they are, end of story.
Female 1: You are right Male 1, but even if the government lies about the number of cases, they cannot lie about the deaths. And what matters in the end is the number of deaths. The number of cases isn’t important. It’s not possible to give a lower number for the deaths. Just not possible.
Female 3: Actually it is. We have seen so many die, but the government declared them as flu or other diseases.
Male 2: They can lie about the cases, deaths, everything. And they have. Of course, who believes these numbers? Even other countries have expressed concern over the reality of the virus in Iran. This is not something to argue about. Why can’t the government lie about deaths? They lie about the elections, saying millions turned up. But I think less than 5 thousand went. At least voluntarily.
Summary and Conclusion
To summarize the discussion I held, the focus group was generally split in two sides. Some opposing and some defending. The members of the group were very well informed, some politically, others institutionally, or some being nurses working on the field at this moment, so we had a lot of ideas and opinions.
To conclude the given instruments, for the first part, it was hard to reach a conclusion, because there were a lot of opinions, but I can conclude that the government did not do enough at the time it should have. The country is witnessing an uncontrollable outbreak right now. Everyone did agree on the part that it acted too late. But this part of the discussion got a little rough, because some opposed the government, and others didn’t and tried to blame the people.
For the second part, we reached several conclusions. That the main reason was the timing of the virus. It was the Persian New Years. So it lead to a lot of people heading out and not obeying the rules. We also concluded that it was also the lack of trust of the people towards the government that they didn’t respect the measures. Also, we did agree that the poor economy was also to blame. Many people have to work during the day to have food to eat at night. Therefore, this leads to breaking the rules and not staying home.
The third and final part of our discussion, was again a little rough, and it kind of got mixed up in the beginning, and they were arguing that the government itself doesn’t know the real numbers because not everyone can get checked. After the question was understood, we did reach a conclusion that the government is intentionally hiding the true numbers and didn’t want the truth to go out. Not only the number of cases, but also the number of deaths.
This focus group was a unique experience that opened my view very much, to see how different people understand the society around them, even if they are living very close together. I can relate this small group to a bigger audience, like the general population and determine the reactions that can be expected from them.
Critique
I can conclude that it was a very successful and well worthy discussion, but I should have conducted it more accurately. My instruments were not too clear for everyone, it did lead to arguments. It got a little too political, and I should have expressed my questions in a different matter. The group was very good, but maybe I shouldn’t have mixed up politically active people with the neutral people because it wasn’t easy to reach a conclusion. I didn’t engage in the discussion too much because I was focused on typing everything. But the next time I should lead the discussion, and control so we reach smoother conclusions and not result in arguments. The issue I brought up, is an issue that everyone is suffering from right now, so people were fed up with it, and everyone wanted to blame someone. We weren’t really thinking out of the box. Just from our own knowledge. Maybe this issue would have been better 3 months from now, so people won’t be so distressed on the matter.
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