Health Ministry chief Ash cautions it is still unclear how vaccine-resistant the strain may be; virus czar Zarka says it will take another week to clarify the impact of the variant
Health Ministry Director-General Nachman Ash and coronavirus czar Salman Zarka said Sunday that it was too early for Israel to let its guard down over the highly mutated Omicron coronavirus variant.
“It is impossible to issue a call for calm over the Omicron variant,” Ash told the Kan public broadcaster.
The health official added that the strain is “still spreading in South Africa and we do not know the data regarding its resistance to the vaccine.”
Ash also addressed the matter of Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s wife Gilat taking their children on a vacation overseas just days after the premier recommended that Israelis not travel abroad and shuttered the country to tourists to prevent an outbreak of the new COVID-19 variant.
“Elected officials are expected to set a personal example, but the question of family members is more complex,” Ash said.
“In general, I say that this is not the time to travel abroad because of the fear of the new variant. In principle, it would be good if [Gilat Bennett] had stayed in the country, but I do not know all the considerations,” Ash said.
Meanwhile, coronavirus czar Salman Zarka, who is spearheading the national response to the pandemic, also cautioned against premature celebration.
“There are seven cases of the Omicron strain in Israel — three of them are vaccinated and four unvaccinated. It is impossible to deduce information from these statistics,” he told Army Radio.
“We have to wait another week to know for sure what the strain means. At the moment we are being careful and hope that next week we will only be dealing with the Delta variant,” Zarka said.
When asked about a potential easing of the recent restrictions imposed with the discovery of the strain, Zarka said the first stage would be a cancellation of isolation requirements for those who are fully vaccinated.
“The first thing we would like to ease, of the steps we have taken, is for vaccinated people to no longer have to be in isolation. But we will wait a few more days,” he said.
Even as concerns remain over the variant, Israel’s coronavirus statistics were on an encouraging trajectory Saturday, with the virus reproduction rate dropping below 1 to 0.98.
The figure represents the number of people each confirmed patient infects, on average. Any number below 1 signifies that the pandemic is contracting.
Zarka said he believed this was due to changes in behavior by Israelis with the announcement of the discovery of the Omicron strain.
“This can be attributed to the high vigilance in the public since the discovery of the new variant,” he said.
Health Ministry data on Saturday evening showed that 447 people had been diagnosed the previous day, with the number representing 0.51 percent of the 89,000 tests conducted.
The number of patients in serious condition stood at 111, while the death toll was 8,199.
However, Channel 12 news reported that some 16% of Israelis who arrived in the country this week failed to conduct a second coronavirus test three days after their arrival as the government has instructed. If such a rate is maintained, the network noted, some 18,000 people a week could fail to take the test, creating a serious risk that the Omicron strain could enter the country and spread widely.
Although officials have agreed to push for fines of thousands of shekels against travelers who do not comply with the new rules, they have not yet gone into effect.
The Health Ministry has so far confirmed seven cases of the variant in Israel.
The ministry said there were a further 27 coronavirus cases that had not yet been confirmed to be the Omicron strain but that officials had a “high suspicion” was the new variant.
As reported by The Times of Israel