If this was true, which it certainly is not and has no basis in scientific reality, the detector would be a welcome addition to the toolkit for combating the COVID-19 pandemic in Iran. Officially, Iran has had 76,389 confirmed cases of individuals contracting the virus since the beginning of the year, 4,777 of which have died. However, the United States and others, including members of the country's own parliament, have questioned the accuracy of those figures, which officials may be keeping low to try to deflect from the poor initial response to the pandemic and the growing strain it is having on Iran's medical system. Criticism of the regime's handling of the crisis has been growing in the country.

In addition to the COVID-19 detector, the head of the Iranian military's ground forces, Brigadier General Kiomars Heidari, separately announced this week that "a mega project for sterilizing cities and open areas" was underway. He also said the country's Army was working to make fixed and mobile military hospitals available to the general populace to respond to the pandemic and was working on projects to produce masks and disinfectants.

Whatever steps the Iranian government is actually taking, the IRGC's virus detector is completely bogus. The BBC's Shayan Sardarizadeh, who specializes in uncovering actual fake news and disinformation, pointed out in a series of Tweets on Apr. 15 that detector's wand component had a collapsible antenna, similar to the one you might see on a portable radio.