“Give a shoulder” operation: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Health Minister Yuli Edelstein received the second dose of the corona virus this evening (Saturday). At the end, they were given a “yellow passport” confirming receipt of the two packages. As of tonight, about 1.8 million Israelis have been vaccinated in the first dose. According to the goal set by Netanyahu, the goal is to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 in two doses by the end of March.
Prime Minister Netanyahu receives the second dose of vaccine against Corona // Photo: GPO
“I am skilled but excited, and I am sure that all Israeli citizens who are about to receive the second dose of vaccines are as excited as I am,” Netanyahu said. “Through Operation Returning to Life, we will be able to open up our economy soon; pubs, restaurants, gyms, schools, synagogues, and theaters. We will do this with a green passport, which we will detail below.”
“For that to happen, I need two things from you, the citizens of Israel: to give a shoulder to the vaccine and a shoulder to quarantine against the mutations. We are doing this together. We entered Corona together and we will be the first in the world and stronger than ever.”
Health Minister Edelstein said: “Three weeks ago we received the first dose. Only 3 weeks have passed and already 1.8 million received the first dose. Tonight the citizens of Israel will also receive the second dose. We are close to the light, let us all be careful to become the first country in the world. “Its citizens are vaccinated. At the moment, 20 percent of the population is vaccinated, 70 percent of the populations are already at risk, most of the medical staff are vaccinated, many of the security forces are vaccinated. Let’s continue this way to get out of the disease. We can do it with your cooperation.”
After fears that the vaccination campaign would slow down, last week breakthroughs were achieved with both Modern and Pfizer, which agreed to bring forward their shipments to Israel. The first shipment of Moderna, with more than 100,000 packages, landed in the country on Thursday. The vaccines from this shipment will be used for the benefit of the houseboys, to whom there is a logistical difficulty in transporting the Pfizer vaccines.
On Tuesday, Netanyahu announced that a new agreement had also been signed with Pfizer, under which the company’s millions of vaccines will begin to arrive in Israel gradually starting tomorrow. Pfizer was impressed by the unprecedented pace and efficiency of the vaccination campaign in the country, and by the digital databases of the HMOs, which can help the company generate insights regarding the effectiveness of the vaccine in different population groups.
In exchange for speeding up shipments, Israel will share statistics with Pfizer and the World Health Organization. It should be emphasized that this is not personal data of citizens, but only statistics of different population groups. Pfizer is interested in proving through Israel the effectiveness of its vaccine in eradicating the epidemic in an entire country in a short period of time – provided that the vaccination campaign is conducted efficiently and professionally, as is happening in Israel.
The number of active corona patients in Israel continues to rise and now stands at 68,766. There is also a large increase in the number of inpatients (1,646) – of whom 270 are in moderate condition, 964 are in serious condition (of whom 300 are in critical condition) and 236 are respirated. In fact, this is a new record in the number of serious patients in the current wave of morbidity.
The detection of the mutation was achieved following an initiated operation led by the Ministry of Health with the Home Front Command, with the aim of detecting the mutation early and preventing its spread in the community. The Ministry of Health emphasized that the different variants cause faster infection, but probably do not cause more serious illness.
Meital Yasur Beit-Or participated in the preparation of the article