At least 13 Tehran taxi drivers have died after contracting a coronavirus (COVID-19) infection, while a minimum of 300 more have caught the disease, IRNA reported on April 13.

Hailing a taxi in Iran is typically a communal affair where several people jump in and out of the cab as it meanders the streets. Such usage raises the risk of respiratory infections for the driver and the passengers. However, a new rule introduced in the Iranian capital stipulates that only three people can travel in a taxi at once.

The news of the deaths reached the top of Tehran City Council, where Mohsen Hashemi—son of former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani—and now the city council chief raised his concerns over people being in such close confines.

“Considering the virus is still lurking around the city, and that the situation has not yet returned to normal, the restarting of daily activities can make it difficult to deal with [preventing] deaths related to the disease,” Hashemi said.

He noted that the health ministry had defined public transport as an area of significant COVID-19 transmission and said that all measures were being pursued to keep public transportation systems disinfected.

Hashemi also observed that a point of concern is that Tehran Metro uses circulated air on its train cars.

City authorities been disinfecting cars, buses, rail stations and trains on an hourly basis to stem the spread of the virus. Still, with many people expected to return to work on April 18 in Tehran following the end of the Persian Nowruz new year holidays and the lifting of a ban on “low risk” business activities, there is much anxiety that such efforts will not be effective enough.

On April 14, Iran reported that its official 24-hour death rate for people that have contracted the coronavirus had fallen to below a three-digit figure for the first time in a month. The day saw 98 fatalities linked to COVID-19.

Iran has experienced the worst outbreak of the virus in the Middle East. By the end of April 14, the country’s pandemic death toll stood at 4,683 while the number of officially reported infections was 74,877. Of that figure, some 48,129 cases were listed under “patient recovered”, while 691 were classified under “severe condition”.

The health ministry said 287,359 coronavirus diagnostic tests had been carried out to date. Iran’s population stands at around 83mn.