The deteriorating health of Neda Badakhsh, a 62-year-old Baha’i prisoner held in Dolatabad Prison in Isfahan, has raised growing concerns over her continued denial of adequate medical care.
Despite serving more than seven months of her sentence, her requests for medical leave, conditional release, and electronic ankle monitoring have all been rejected.
According to human rights organizations, Badakhsh suffers from multiple medical conditions and severe physical pain that require specialized treatment outside prison.
However, sources close to her family say that prison and judicial authorities have repeatedly denied her and her family's requests for transfer to medical facilities or access to legal alternatives available under Iranian law.
Badakhsh is serving a five-year prison sentence on the charge of "conducting educational and propaganda activities against the sacred law of Islam." According to human rights reports, the accusation stems from her voluntary teaching of mathematics and Persian language to Afghan children who had been denied access to education.
On December 27, 2025, Badakhsh was arrested along with seven other Baha’i women—Negin Khademi, Shana Shoughifar, Parastoo Hakim, Mojgan Shahrezaei, Yeganeh Rouhbakhsh, Arezoo Sobhanian, and Neda Emadi—after being summoned to Branch Two of the Enforcement Office of the Isfahan Revolutionary Court.
They were subsequently transferred to Dolatabad Prison.
Human rights advocates have described Badakhsh's continued deprivation of specialized medical care as deeply alarming and have called on the Iranian authorities to ensure her immediate access to appropriate medical treatment in accordance with international human rights standards.
According to the original court ruling, Neda Badakhsh was sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment, fined 100 million tomans, banned from leaving the country for two years, and prohibited from using social media for two years.
The charge against her was "conducting educational and propaganda activities against the sacred law of Islam," although reports indicate that her activities consisted of voluntarily teaching mathematics and Persian to Afghan children who had been deprived of education.
