Human Rights Watch has accused Iranian officials of deliberately denying medical treatment to three female inmates who subsequently died. In an Oct. 20 press release, HRW said withholding medical care from the three women held in Qarchak Prison for female offenders was a violation of prisoners’ right to life.
The three women — Soudabeh Asadi, Jamile Azizi, and political prisoner Somayeh Rashidi – were denied medical care while in Qarchak, which is notorious for its dire conditions, including its lack of sanitation, overcrowded cells and limited access to basic amenities and medical treatment.
“Prisons in Iran, especially Qarchak, have become places of torment and death where prisoners’ dignity and basic rights are systematically ignored,” Michael Page, HRW’s deputy Middle East director said in the statement. “For decades, the authorities have not only failed to improve conditions but have deliberately used the denial of even the most basic rights, such as access to medical care, as a tool of repression and punishment against prisoners.”
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All three women died in September, within days of one another. Asadi, who was held on financial charges, fell ill but was denied a timely transfer to a medical center. Her condition deteriorated and she died on Sept. 26, according to the human rights organization Hengaw.
Rashidi fell seriously ill while in prison and was initially denied medical care by prison doctors who accused her of exaggerating her symptoms and prescribed mental health medications. She then had several seizures and fell into a coma. Prison officials transferred Rashidi to Mofatteh Hospital where she died on Sep. 25, according to Hengaw. Rashidi’s family was pressured by authorities to say that her death was due to “a hospital error.”
Commenting on Rashidi’s treatment in prison, HRW said: “Consistent with authorities’ long-standing patterns of denial, distortion, and evading responsibility, within several days after Rashidi’s death, the judiciary claimed that she had a history of drug use and neurological disorders and received appropriate treatment in prison.”
Azizi died on Sept. 19 due to a lack of proper medical care. Sources familiar with the case told Hengaw that the prison’s infirmary staff had noted signs of a stroke and decided to return Azizi to her ward without providing any medical treatment.
At least two other women have died at Qarchak since the start of 2025. They are Maryam Shahraki, who died on Sept. 13; and Farzaneh Bijanipour who died on Jan. 11, according to Hengaw.
The U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) said in an Oct. 1 statement that a total of six prisoners across jails in Iran had died in September due to illness and lack of access to timely treatment.
Another three female prisoners – Maryam Akbari Monfared, Warisha Moradi and Zeynab Jalalian – are currently in need of urgent medical care, according to Amnesty International.
The United Nations has also reported concerns raised by one of its consultative bodies the Zagros Human Rights Center, also known as the Centre Zagros pour les Droits de l’Homme (CZDH) in a June 10 report produced by the U.N. Human Rights Council.
The written statement by CZDH, titled “Systematic violations against political prisoners in the Islamic Republic of Iran” described several alleged human rights violations connected to the state’s mass executions, torture and ill treatment of prisoners.
It added that what it called “suspicious deaths in detention” in Iran’s prisons or shortly after release had increased in recent years.
A 2022 report by Amnesty International titled “Deadly denial of medical care in Iran’s prisons” found that 96 deaths in custody had occurred since 2010 due to lack of access to medical care, and said that the actual figure was likely to be much higher.
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“The Iranian authorities are committing shocking violations of the right to life by deliberately denying ailing prisoners lifesaving healthcare,” Amnesty said in the report. “These violations of the right to life stem from an institutional culture in Iran’s prisons which has little regard for sanctity of human life and the inherent dignity of prisoners and are facilitated by unchecked powers granted to prison officials, amid a culture of impunity for torture and other ill-treatment and other violations against prisoners.”
Of the 96 prisoners who were reported by Amnesty to have died after being denied medical treatment, four were women. The majority of these deaths – 65 in total – occurred in 2017. Amnesty found that most prisoners who died in this way were young or middled aged, with 27 percent in their thirties and 25 percent in their forties.
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