There's no doubt that the government has already been very successful – not in fighting the pandemic, but in dismantling, trampling, and smashing public solidarity and trust, which are the social and national basis without which COVID cannot be defeated.
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We might discover how much damage has actually been done not only as we grapple with the fifth wave of COVID that is currently flooding Israel, but also as we face other national challenges in areas other than public health.
Social solidarity is vital so we can believe that in a pandemic, the government, society, and the community are also concerned with the weak, the poor, and the sick, and so we can take significant steps that benefit not only our own health and welfare, but that of the community and the country as a whole. Vaccines are exactly the kind of step designed to protect us and our beloved families, but they also protect the health of the nation when a majority of the public is vaccinated. The public's faith in the healthcare system and the government is critical, and determines how willing citizens will be to follow the recommendations, instructions, and regulations that seek to contain the spread of the virus and reduce harm to the public.
The system of regulations for the pandemic cannot be based on enforcement and punishment alone, so the trust of the public, along with the sense of solidarity, will decide to what extent it complies. But now it seems as if the public is less and less willing to trust the instructions or put its faith in social solidarity.
The fifth wave of COVID has also seen a new disgraceful low. For the first time in the history of the public healthcare system in Israel, the Health Ministry is demanding that the public pay for expensive tests (which are sold without any government control or subsidy) to test for the virus. The healthcare system in Israel has never seen anything like this, and it can be expected to widen social and medical care discrepancies in Israel. And all this is happening under a health minister from a party that espouses socialism, justice, equality, and fraternity in the supply of basic services like healthcare.
Not only have the testing kits been "privatized," forcing vaccinated Israelis to pay for the tests out of pocket – they main problem is that the new policy rests on an incorrect assessment of the extent to which the public is willing to comply. Under the new framework, each and every one of us has to trust that dozens to several hundred thousand other Israelis will test themselves at home, and if the tests turn out positive, arrive for confirmation tests through Magen David Adom or the IDF Home Front Command. And then we are supposed to trust them to stay in quarantine, without any documentation or oversight that ensures they will.
The government had plenty of time to prepare for the Omicron wave before it reached Israel. It could have set up many more testing sites and launched rapid testing through the country's four HMOs, which comprise the fullest deployment of healthcare services in the country. It could have promoted vaccination much more extensively, including in schools, over the education minister's unforgiveable obstacles, and it could have prepared and funded hospitals to care for seriously ill patients and patients on ventilators.
It is in the interest of public health to reinstate limitations to gatherings and go back to distance learning and work from home, but unfortunately, the prime minister does not have the political strength to do it, and there aren't enough senior officials in the Health Ministry who are determined to fight for our health. And there is a Treasury and a finance minister who brutally – and again, unforgivably – is managing to keep the government from spending even a shekel to compensate the people whose livelihoods have been hurt by COVID.
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