Only when her condition became critical was action taken
In a provincial hospital in Zanjan, Iran, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi lies in critical condition — a woman who has spent her life advocating for human rights now dependent on the very state she has challenged to preserve her life. After 140 days of imprisonment during which officials reportedly withheld adequate medical care despite knowledge of her serious cardiac and pulmonary history, her body has registered what her voice was never permitted to say freely. Her case asks an ancient question that power has always struggled to answer: what does a society owe to those it chooses to silence?
- A Nobel laureate suffered a cardiac crisis inside an Iranian prison after 140 days of detention during which officials repeatedly refused to transfer her to medical care.
- Her blood pressure collapsed and could not be stabilized, compounding a history of pulmonary embolism and prior heart procedures that require specialist intervention unavailable at the local hospital.
- Her family and the Nobel Peace Prize Committee are urgently demanding transfer to Tehran, where physicians familiar with her complex medical history could resume her treatment.
- The delay in care has already caused damage her family describes as potentially irreversible, raising the possibility that the crisis was not an oversight but a consequence of deliberate neglect.
- She now faces an additional seven-and-a-half-year sentence imposed in February, meaning even recovery would return her to the conditions that produced this emergency.
Narges Mohammadi, the Iranian human rights campaigner awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2023, was rushed to a hospital in Zanjan province on Friday after her health collapsed inside prison. She is 54 years old. Her family says the transfer came only after 140 days of detention during which officials repeatedly refused to act, despite full knowledge of her serious heart and lung conditions.
Her brother Hamidreza, speaking from Norway, described the situation with grim precision: her blood pressure had dropped sharply, she had suffered a heart attack, and the hospital in Zanjan lacked the specialists her case required. She has a history of pulmonary embolism and has undergone stenting and angiography — procedures demanding expert follow-up care. He called for her immediate transfer to Tehran, where the physicians who know her history could treat her.
Mohammadi was arrested in December in Mashhad after speaking at a memorial for a fellow activist. Her family says she was beaten during the arrest. In February, a Revolutionary Court added seven and a half years to her sentence on charges of collusion and propaganda. She was then transferred without warning to Zanjan prison, where contact with her family was severely restricted.
This is not new terrain for her. She has been arrested 13 times and sentenced to a cumulative 31 years in prison. She was temporarily released from Evin prison in late 2024 on medical grounds, but continued her advocacy — an act that led directly to her arrest in Mashhad.
The Nobel Committee stated that her life remains at risk. Her family's foundation called her deterioration catastrophic and warned that the hospital transfer may have come too late. What the case lays bare is a pattern: officials knew her cardiac history, knew her blood pressure was failing, and waited 140 days before acting. She now lies in a facility her family says cannot adequately care for her, while the specialists who understand her condition remain in Tehran.
Narges Mohammadi, the Iranian human rights campaigner who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2023, was rushed to a hospital in Zanjan province on Friday after her health collapsed inside prison. She is 54 years old. Her family said the transfer came as a last resort, after 140 days of detention during which prison officials had repeatedly refused to move her to medical care despite knowing about her serious heart and lung conditions.
Her brother Hamidreza, who lives in Norway, described the crisis to the BBC on Saturday with clinical precision. Her blood pressure had dropped sharply and doctors could not stabilize it. Beyond that immediate emergency, she was experiencing a heart attack. The problem, he explained, was that the hospital in Zanjan where she now lay could not adequately treat her. She had a history of pulmonary embolism. She had undergone stenting and angiography—procedures that require specialists. The local doctors simply did not have the expertise her case demanded. He was calling for her to be transferred to Tehran, where the physicians who had treated her before could resume her care.
Mohammadi was arrested in December in the north-eastern city of Mashhad after speaking at a memorial ceremony for another human rights activist. Her family said she was beaten during the arrest. In February, a Revolutionary Court sentenced her to an additional seven and a half years in prison on charges of gathering, collusion, and propaganda activities. She was then moved without warning to Zanjan prison, where communication with her family became severely restricted.
This is not her first brush with Iran's detention system. Over her lifetime, she has been arrested 13 times. Courts have sentenced her to a total of 31 years in prison and ordered 154 lashes. In 2021, she began serving a 13-year sentence on charges of propaganda against the state and collusion against state security—charges she denied. In December 2024, she was temporarily released from Tehran's Evin prison on medical grounds. But she did not stop her work. While undergoing treatment, she continued campaigning. That activism led directly to her arrest in Mashhad.
The Nobel Peace Prize Committee, through its head Jorgen Watne Frydnes, issued a statement to Reuters saying that Mohammadi's life remained at risk. Her family's foundation released a statement describing her deterioration as catastrophic and calling the hospital transfer a move that may have come too late. The implication was clear: the delay in providing medical care had already done damage that might not be reversible.
What makes this case particularly stark is the pattern it reveals. Prison officials knew about her cardiac history. They knew about her blood pressure problems. They knew she had undergone complex heart procedures. And for 140 days, they did not transfer her to a hospital. Only when her condition became critical enough that ignoring it was no longer possible did they act. Now she sits in a facility her family says cannot treat her, while the specialists who understand her medical history remain in Tehran, waiting.
Citas Notables
Her blood pressure has dropped sharply, and they haven't been able to stabilise it.— Hamidreza Mohammadi, her brother, to the BBC
Mohammadi's life remained at risk— Jorgen Watne Frydnes, head of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee, to Reuters
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why does it matter that she's in Zanjan and not Tehran? They're both hospitals.
Because she's not a routine patient. She's had stenting, angiography, pulmonary embolism. The doctors in Zanjan don't have her records, don't know her case, don't have the equipment or training for what she needs. In Tehran, her own specialists are waiting. That's the difference between adequate care and guesswork.
Her family says prison officials refused to move her for 140 days. Why would they do that?
Control, partly. Moving a high-profile prisoner to a major hospital in Tehran means more visibility, more international attention, more difficulty keeping her isolated. A local hospital in Zanjan is quieter. But the cost of that quiet is that she nearly died.
She's been arrested 13 times. Is this a pattern of how Iran treats political prisoners?
It's one case, but yes—the refusal to provide adequate medical care to someone they're holding is documented. She's not unique in that. What makes her case visible is that she won the Nobel Prize. Most political prisoners don't have that platform.
What happens next?
That depends on whether Tehran agrees to transfer her. If they do, she has a chance at proper treatment. If they don't, she remains in a hospital that can't help her, with a seven-and-a-half-year sentence waiting when she's released—if she's released.
Does winning the Nobel Prize protect her?
It gives her family a voice. It gives the Nobel Committee standing to make demands. But it doesn't change the fact that she's in Iranian custody, and the Iranian government decides what happens to her.