[icegreentea2]

Yes, but this dataset is essentially manually populated. Someone has to isolate coronavirus from a patient, sequence it, and then upload it to GISAID.

So the question is why is it ominous that no one in Iran has isolated and uploaded a sequence?

[skrtskrt]

I believe they meant that it's scary that we don't have data in here from a place where we have heard the virus is both spreading quickly and having a high mortality rate.

Not ominous as in any way indicative of a conspiracy or otherwise.