A staggering 1,077 Iranian workers died in workplace accidents during just the first half of the previous year, averaging nearly 40 deaths per week, according to newly released data from Iran’s Legal Medicine Organization.
The statistics, covering the six-month period beginning in March 2024, paint a grim picture of labor conditions in the Islamic Republic. Iran now ranks 102nd globally in occupational safety standards—an embarrassing and dangerous status for one of the region’s largest economies.
Workplace safety experts have long warned that Iran’s labor environment is plagued by a lack of regulatory enforcement, outdated equipment, and minimal accountability for employers. In many industries, particularly construction, mining, and manufacturing, workers are exposed to daily life-threatening hazards with little to no protective oversight.
Despite the alarming death toll, Iranian authorities have largely downplayed the crisis. Critics argue that the regime invests heavily in funding terrorist proxies across the Middle East—such as Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis—while neglecting basic protections for its own citizens. Billions of dollars that could be used to improve domestic infrastructure and labor safety instead go toward fueling Iran’s regional war machine.
Labor rights activists within Iran, already operating under intense government scrutiny, have struggled to raise awareness due to harsh crackdowns on free speech and union organizing. The regime’s tight grip on media and civil society makes it difficult for families of victims to seek justice or for workers to demand safer conditions.
International labor watchdogs have condemned the Iranian government for failing to meet even minimal safety standards. “Iran’s labor force is being sacrificed on the altar of regime priorities,” said one Middle East labor expert. “When a government chooses missiles over medical care, the consequences are measured in funerals.”
As Iran continues to project power abroad, its domestic failures are becoming harder to conceal. Over a thousand preventable deaths in six months should be a national scandal—but in a regime more focused on ideological warfare than human welfare, worker lives remain expendable. While Tehran boasts of its regional influence, its workers are paying the ultimate price for the regime’s negligence.
