WASHINGTON — A Navy veteran released from an Iranian prison last week on a medical furlough says he is sick with symptoms of the coronavirus and is requesting a humanitarian evacuation to the United States for medical treatment.
Michael White was hospitalized yesterday in a ward for coronavirus patients in Iran and has experienced fever, fatigue, a cough and shortness of breath since his furlough last week, according to a statement from Jon Franks, a family spokesman, to The Associated Press.
White, of Imperial Beach, California, “is an immunocompromised cancer patient and his situation is urgent,” Franks says. White has been tested for the coronavirus but the results have not come back.
White was detained in July 2018 while visiting a girlfriend in Iran and was later convicted of insulting Iran’s supreme leader and posting private information.
He is among tens of thousands of prisoners granted medical furloughs by Iran as the country tries to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
— AP
An undated photo of US Navy veteran Michael White, who was arrested in Iran in July 2018 while visiting his girlfriend. (screen capture: NBC news)
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