The Health Ministry reported 57,563 new coronavirus cases on Friday morning. In the past 24 hours, 224,096 Israelis were screened for the virus, which puts the infection rate at 25.69%. The reproduction rate, which relates to the number of people each confirmed carrier infects, continued to decrease and stands at 1.
Follow Israel Hayom on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram
There are 483,228 active cases in the country with 2,438 patients hospitalized. Of those, 946 are in serious condition, 291 are critically ill, 213 are on ventilators and 18 are connected to ECMO machines. Currently, 162,853 Israelis are in quarantine, of whom 1,282 are doctors and 2,793 are nurses.
There are 276 "red" cities in Israel and two "orange" and two "yellow" localities. Under the ministry's "stoplight" ranking, each designation carries different restrictions on public life, particularly public gatherings in closed spaces.
Israel has reported 2,683,443 COVID cases – including 8,556 deaths – since the outbreak of the pandemic two years ago. In the past seven days, 149 Israelis died of the coronavirus. Of those, 12 died in the past 24 hours.
According to Health Ministry data, 623,010 Israelis have received the fourth vaccine dose, 4,436,378 received the third jab, 6,081,269 the second, and 6,689,735 have gotten one shot.
Meanwhile, speaking at a press conference on Thursday, Health Ministry Director-General Nachman Ash defended the government's decision to cancel quarantine requirements for school children.
"Health Ministry experts have been personally attacked recently, and in general. It is unfortunate that [individuals] continue to make baseless accusations and cross red lines," he said. "We are here to serve the public. Public health is our guiding principle and what guides our decisions. To us, political considerations and accusations are not relevant. Our decision-making process is purely professional. If a party disagrees or has a claim, we are open to hearing any opinion."
As per the new guidelines, school children will no longer need to quarantine if they come into contact with a confirmed COVID carrier. Instead, they will be able to return to class pending two negative antigen test results. Previously, students had to self-isolate for 5 days, a move that was approved by the government due to the Omicron variant but sent a record number of Israelis into self-isolation.
Many oppose the new outline, saying it will allow the disease to spread in schools nearly unchecked, endangering both the education staff and the children.
The plan also requires both vaccinated and unvaccinated students to take two at-home antigen tests twice a week, on Sundays and Wednesdays, and report negative results to an Education Ministry portal.
With regard to the new testing requirements, Ash said, "We are certain that the outline is for the benefit of children who struggled with quarantines. The outline creates a balance between the danger of morbidity and the prevention of hurting the studies. It is essential due to the properties of Omicron – more infections, but milder morbidity."
Unfortunately, the ministry's new outline, which came into effect on Thursday morning – did not get off to a smooth start as many parents could not test their children due to a lack of antigen tests across Israeli pharmacies.
In related news, a study by the Clalit Health Fund, which was published in the Science medical journal, found that the parents' vaccination against the coronavirus provides significant protection for their children as well.
According to the research, which studied the effects of the vaccine in the fourth infection wave – when the Delta variant was the dominant strain in Israel – vaccination by two parents with the third vaccine shot reduced the chances of their children getting infected with COVID by 58.1%. Vaccination by one parent alone reduced such a risk by 20.8%.
Similarly, the head of the Paris hospitals system sparked a fierce debate on Wednesday by questioning whether people who refuse to be vaccinated against COVID should continue to have their treatment covered by public health insurance.
Under France's universal healthcare system, all coronavirus patients who end up in intensive care are fully covered for their treatment, which costs about 3,000 euros ($3,340) per day and typically lasts a week to 10 days.
"When free and efficient drugs are available, should people be able to renounce it without consequences ... while we struggle to take care of other patients?" Paris AP-HP hospitals system chief Martin Hirsch said on French television.
Hirsch said he raised the issue because health costs are exploding and that the irresponsible behavior of some should not jeopardize the availability of the system for everyone else.
Subscribe to Israel Hayom's daily newsletter and never miss our top stories!
Several French health professionals rejected his proposal, far-right politicians called for Hirsch to be fired, and Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo – who chairs the AP-HP board and who is the socialist candidate in the April presidential elections – said she disagreed with his proposal. A hashtag calling for Hirsch's dismissal was trending on Twitter in France.
Health Minister Olivier Veran has not commented on Hirsch's call but Olga Givernet, a lawmaker for President Emmanuel Macron's LREM party, said on BFM TV on Thursday that "the issue as raised by the medical community could not be ignored."
A mid-January IFOP poll showed that 51% of French people considered it was justified that non-vaccinated people who wind up in intensive care should pay part or all of their hospital bills.
Conservative Les Republicains lawmaker Sebastien Huyghe – whose bill to make the unvaccinated pay some of their medical costs was rejected by the parliament – said the idea was not to reject the non-vaccinated from intensive care wards but to make them pay a minimum contribution toward the cost of their care.
The proposal would be similar to Singapore, a city-state with one of the world's highest COVID inoculation rates in the world, where people who decline vaccines must pay for their medical treatment.
The median bill size for COVID patients that require intensive care is about $18,483, according to Singapore's Health Ministry.
