Referring to the crisis in the government over the tightening of Corona fines, Health Minister Yuli Edelstein said today (Thursday) that “either there will be a continuation of closure, or my friends in the political system will open everything. There will be no game that leaves some restrictions and it is not over.”
Ministry of Health briefing // Photo: Newsenders
In a media briefing held at Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon alongside senior officials from his office, Edelstein said that the increase in morbidity led to the need to open additional corona wards: “The Ministry of Health is doing everything it can to stop the wave of illness, it is a huge effort that is being carried out on several fronts – we are conducting an unprecedented and unique vaccination campaign in the world. To date, 1.5 million Israeli citizens have received the two vaccine doses. Over the weekend we will reach more than three million citizens who received at least the first vaccine. “However, he cautions, the wave of morbidity refuses to go down -” the reason is probably due to the mutation that is rampant. “
The minister added that unlike the two previous closures, which yielded results in the form of a reduction in morbidity, the current closure has so far not yielded the results expected:There is braking and maybe even the beginning of a descent, but not the sharp descent we expect to see. We closed the airport and it’s good that we did, we will continue to do so as long as necessary. “
The health minister also said that with more than 1,100 corona patients hospitalized in critical condition, the country is in a situation that has not been the same since the plague broke out in the country last year. “Without a significant drop in this number and in the daily verified number, we will not be able to stop the closure. In my opinion, we need a short period of time to continue the restrictions. Getting out of the current situation from the closure is simply lawlessness “They will completely collapse them again.”
Professor Hezi Levy, director general of the Ministry of Health, also spoke at the briefing, saying that the current wave of morbidity shows an increase in the number of serious and critical patients among patients aged 60 and under and an increase in the number of patients in this age group. Saturation hospitalization in hard and respiratory inpatients. There is a regret in the number of patients at a young age in a difficult situation, there is great difficulty and a degree of burnout and fatigue. “
Regarding corona vaccines, Levy said that 1.9 million vaccinators are expected to reach the second dose this week: “The faster we get vaccinated and people come to get vaccinated, the more we hope to reduce the morbidity and move on to routine.”
