Tonight (Saturday), Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will hold a discussion on the entry of the disease into Israel through citizens and visitors entering Israel from Ben Gurion Airport (Ben Gurion Airport). The corona.
The Ministry of Health released the latest corona data tonight, reporting that 7,316 people were diagnosed as positive for the corona virus yesterday. The same patients constitute about 8.8 percent of the 85,739 tests performed. In addition, 1,171 patients were in critical condition, and 4,326 died as a result of the complications of the disease, 40 of them starting at midnight.
The ministry further announced that after genetic sequencing performed on seven pregnant women hospitalized after falling ill in Corona, it discovered that six of them had contracted the British mutation.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in a press briefing yesterday that the British variant of the corona virus may be linked to higher mortality. Johnson added that all the current evidence has shown that both vaccines remain effective against the old and new strains, but explained that in the current morbidity data the closure restrictions cannot be eased.
The UK’s chief scientific adviser, Patrick Valance, added that patients with the British mutation are at increased risk compared to those infected with the original virus. “If you were to take a man in his sixties, the average risk is that for every 1,000 people infected, about ten would be expected to die. With the new version, for every 1,000 people infected, about 13 or 14 could die.”
As a reminder, the World Health Organization announced this week that 60 countries had reported to it that they had located patients in the British mutation on their territory. In addition, about 23 countries reported the presence of the South African mutation. At the same time, a new study published this week showed that Pfizer’s vaccine may protect against the British mutation. The encouraging results come from a blood sample analysis of participants in the company’s trial, after Pfizer announced last week that the vaccine is also effective against another mutation in the virus, which is found in South Africa and is similar to the British mutation.
The current study, published on BioRxiv.org but not yet officially tested by other researchers, was conducted on a synthetic virus that contained about 10 changes that characterize the British mutation compared to the original virus. The new study brings with it further hope, as the number of daily deaths in the UK is breaking records every day. In addition, research shows that they will not have to develop new vaccines for the time being.