A spike in coronavirus infections in Israel is due to the public not following Health Ministry guidelines, outgoing Health Ministry Director-General Moshe Bar Siman Tov said Friday during a special press briefing. At the time there were 85 new coronavirus cases in 24 hours. Less than two hours later, that number jumped to 101 – surpassing a limit set by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in May that could put the country back under lockdown. On Friday night, the Knesset Coronavirus Committee announced it would hold an urgent meeting on Monday to discuss next steps in the process and how to keep Israelis safe while allowing the economy to move forward. “We had a period of euphoria,” Bar Siman Tov said. “Now we have received a wake up call.” He said that the majority of new infections emanated from schools – 7% from middle schools and 35% from high schools. Although there have been murmurs about going back to a capsule system or even shutting down schools again, the director-general said, “We have no regrets” about opening them and “we knew there would be some trial and error. If the data shows we need to close them down again, we will do so.” “We’re trying to reach a balance between maintaining a low number of infections and opening up the economy,” he added.
The country currently has 1,927 coronavirus patients, 35 who are in moderate condition and 39 in serious condition, among them 37 who are intubated. The death toll has reached 284.
In its statement, the ministry said it is monitoring the centers of infection and assessing the situation. The National Information and Knowledge Center has identified key neighborhoods in which it is recommending that the Health Ministry increase screenings. These include Beit Shemeh, Bnei Brak, Hura, Pardes Hannah and Tel Aviv.
Four drive-in coronavirus screening centers are expected to open in four cities: Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Haifa and Beersheba. The centers will be operated by MDA, as a surge in coronavirus tests is expected as a response to the rise in cases.
The Jerusalem center will open on Saturday and is meant to process the 1,400 checks required to determine the outbreak situation in Gymnasia Rehavia after the school reported several cases this week.
Head of Public Health Sigal Sadetsky said during the Friday briefing that the ministry is also focused on maintaining an increased level of testing at senior living facilities and of students and teachers – even if they are asymptomatic – who came in contact with an infected person at their school.
In terms of the number of tests, in the last day, 4,182 people were screened for SARS-CoV-2 and 1.5% of them came out positive. This is a significant increase in the positive percentage of tests compared to the previous days, when only around .5% came out positive.
During the week of March 15 to 21, the average number of new daily patients was 84. The next week, between March 22 to 28, that number spiked to an average of 390. Remember, it was at a press conference on May 4 that Netanyahu said that restrictions would be restored of the Health Ministry saw any of the following three scenarios: More than 100 new patients per day; a doubling of the number of patients in 10 days; or 250 patients in serious condition. At the press briefing, the number of daily patients was 85 and Bar Siman Tov acknowledged that the country was likely to pass this threshold. He said that the government and the ministry would work together to evaluate the changes they made in recent weeks and revise as necessary. Meanwhile, more students and teachers are being diagnosed with the virus, as well as some medical professionals. On Friday afternoon, two nurses employed by Hillel Yaffe Medical Center in Hadera were diagnosed with the virus, causing more than 41 members of the hospital’s staff to go into isolation. Shortly thereafter, a doctor from Soroka Medical Center in Beersheba tested positive, putting 31 members of the staff into isolation. Later, it was announced that members of the Beitar Jerusalem youth group were going into isolation after three players tested positive for coronavirus, according to The Jerusalem Post’s sister publication, Maariv. The groups were reportedly separated for training and did not have access to others in the training compound.
Earlier in the day, a boy who learns at kindergarten for foreign students in southern Tel Aviv tested positive, sending 30 children and three staff members into isolation. Sadetsky said that the country is seeing a spike in infections among foreign workers and that this is not limited to people from a certain country or living in a certain geographic area in Israel. She said she believes that it is a result of allowing people to gather more than anything else.
The Jerusalem Municipality announced on Friday that 78 students and teachers from the Gymnasia Rehavia school were diagnosed with coronavirus. So far, according to the school, some 700 students and staff members have been tested at Hadassah Ein Kerem. This means the infection rate at the school is just over 11%, and by Sunday, it is expected that all students and staff members will be screened. The municipality said that it also plans to test all of the students’ family members.
However, a senior official with one of the HMOs told N12 that testing without isolation could lead to more infection. “If there is a student who tests negative, what does he do?,” the official said. “Because he tested negative, he could go out to the bars.” But the official warned that the test could be false and that student should be in isolation: “He must quarantine because he has been exposed to a positive patient and the incubation period is up to 14 days.”
However, a senior official with one of the HMOs told N12 that testing without isolation could lead to more infection. “If there is a student who tests negative, what does he do?,” the official said. “Because he tested negative, he could go out to the bars.” But the official warned that the test could be false and that student should be in isolation: “He must quarantine because he has been exposed to a positive patient and the incubation period is up to 14 days.”
Three family members in Or Yehuda tested positive. One of the children was a student at an area preschool, which means all his classmates and teachers are now in isolation, too.
In addition, teachers at three schools in the Bedouin village of Saifa in the Negev were found sick. The Health Ministry said it will test all their colleagues in the coming days.
There have also been students found sick in Bat Yam.
“It is clear to us that the rules in general, and especially in schools, are not being strictly adhered to,” a senior Health Ministry official told Ynet. The recent spike, Bar Siman Tov, is also proving that hot weather does not stop the novel coronavirus from spreading. Earlier in the day, the ministry sent a special message to the public asking people to uphold three rules: good hygiene, wearing masks and social distancing. “The ministry calls on the public not to go into complacency and strictly adhere to the guidelines,” the statement read. “The mood that the coronavirus is behind us is wrong.” On Thursday, Health Minister Yuli Edelstein, Education Minister Yoav Galant and Higher Education Minister Ze’ev Elkin announced that colleges and universities, informal education programs and post-high school seminaries and yeshivas could resume in-person classes beginning as early as Sunday. Originally, colleges and universities were only slated to return mid-June and there had been no decision on the other programs.
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