• News
  • Sport
  • TV
  • Radio
  • Education
  • TV Licences
  • Contact Us
No Result
View All Result
  • SOUTH AFRICA
  • POLITICS
  • BUSINESS
  • SPORT
  • AFRICA
  • WORLD
  • SCI-TECH
  • LIFESTYLE
  • FEATURES
  • OPINION
Home Sci-tech

Israel to offer fourth COVID vaccine shot to over 60s, medical staff

3 January 2022, 4:22 AM  |
Reuters Reuters |  @SABCNews
Health worker preparing COVID-19 vaccine.

Health worker preparing COVID-19 vaccine.

Image: Reuters

Health worker preparing COVID-19 vaccine.

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said on Sunday that Israel would offer a fourth dose of COVID-19 vaccine to people over 60 and to medical staff as it faces a surge in Omicron variant infections.

Israel last week approved a fourth dose of the vaccine developed by Pfizer (PFE.N) and BioNTech (22UAy.DE), a second booster, for people who are immune-compromised and the elderly living in care homes.

“We now have a new layer of defence,” Bennett said in a televised news conference, adding that Israel’s top government medical official, whose approval is needed to expand the booster campaign, had signed off on the latest move.

“Israel will once again be pioneering the global vaccination effort,” Bennett said.

Earlier, the Health Ministry’s Director-General Nachman Ash said Israel could reach herd immunity as Omicron infections mounted and Merck & Co’s (MRK.N) molnupiravir anti-viral pill was approved for use in COVID-19 patients over 18.

Herd immunity is the point at which a population is protected from a virus, either through vaccination or by people having developed antibodies by contracting the disease.

The highly transmissible Omicron variant has caused a wave of coronavirus cases, with worldwide infections hitting a record high, with an average of just over one million cases detected each day between Dec. 24 and 30, Reuters data showed.

Deaths, however, have not risen to the same degree, raising hopes that the new variant is less lethal, a view Bennett also echoed in describing the second booster as largely a bid to prevent serious illness among the elderly.

Daily cases in Israel are expected to reach record highs in the coming three weeks. Bennett said that up to 50,000 people might soon be infected each day, while eligibility for testing could be tightened to help relieve long lines at testing stations.

“The (infection) numbers will have to be very high in order to reach herd immunity,” Ash told 103 FM Radio earlier. “This is possible but we don’t want to reach it by means of infections, we want it to happen as a result of many people vaccinating.”

The head of the health ministry’s coronavirus task force, Salman Zarka, said herd immunity was far from guaranteed, because experience over the past two years showed that some COVID-19 patients who recovered were later reinfected.

Israel’s health ministry says around 60% of its 9.4 million population are fully vaccinated, almost all with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, which means they have either received three doses or have recently had their second.

But hundreds of thousands of those eligible for a third inoculation have so far not taken it.

Over the past 10 days, daily infections have more than quadrupled. Severe cases have also climbed, but at a far lower rate, rising from about 80 to around 100.

Share article
Tags: IsraelCOVID-19
Previous Post

Omicron-related disruptions cause over 4,000 flight cancellations to kick off 2022

Next Post

‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ Continues Box Office Domination, Crosses $600 Million in North America

Related Posts

The logo of the US Central Intelligence Agency is shown in the lobby of the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia.

Russia blocks CIA, FBI websites for ‘spreading false information’: TASS

27 January 2023, 7:23 PM
People work at the site after the announcement of the discovery of 4 300-year-old sealed tombs in Egypt's Saqqara necropolis, in Giza, Egypt, January 26, 2023.

Archaeologist hails possibly ‘oldest’ mummy yet found in Egypt

27 January 2023, 3:06 PM
A boy plays with water on a hot summer day.

These groups are the most vulnerable to suffer effects of heat wave

27 January 2023, 11:17 AM

LIVE: 3D Construction Printing Housing Project launch

27 January 2023, 11:00 AM
3D construction printing technology.

3D technology project aims to modernise construction industry: DSI

27 January 2023, 10:20 AM
3D construction printing technology.

SA’s first 3D construction printing technology to be unveiled

27 January 2023, 7:15 AM
Next Post
Cast members Benedict Wong, Benedict Cumberbatch, Jacob Batalon, Marisa Tomei, Zendaya and Tom Holland pose for a photograph as they attend the premiere for the film Spider-Man: No Way Home in Los Angeles, California, December 13, 2021.

'Spider-Man: No Way Home' Continues Box Office Domination, Crosses $600 Million in North America

Most Viewed

  • 24hrs
  • Week
  • Month
  • Northern Cape’s Kakamas to be exempted from blackouts
  • Scorcher predicted in Northern Cape for two weeks
  • Chances of reaching Stage 8 blackouts are receding: Eskom
  • Residents shut down Komani over power woes
  • Eswatini human rights lawyer gunned down in the presence of his family
  • Parts of the Northern Cape to be exempted from rolling blackouts
  • VIDEO | St Benedict College’s Matric learner gets 11 distinctions
  • Limpopo matriculant from child-headed household attains diploma pass
  • Female circumcision practice thriving in Eastern Cape
  • Babes Wodumo breaks her silence at Mampintsha’s funeral
  • Diepsloot residents block N14 highway
  • LIVE: City of Joburg Council elects new mayor
  • KZN farmer fined R1.5 million for unauthorised water use
  • Al Jamah’s Thapelo Amad touted to be Joburg’s new mayor
  • VIDEO | Government has no concrete plan to deal with load shedding: Malema

LATEST

More than 14 000 athletes at the start of the 2022 Comrades Marathon.
  • Sport

Registration for 2023 Comrades Marathon open


[File photo] ANC flag seen at an event.
  • Politics

Mahlengi Bhengu appointed ANC chief spokesperson


File image: EFF leader Julius Malema.
  • Politics

Malema calls on South Africans to reject Just Energy Transition


Eskom says stage 4 will be implemented in the evenings from 16:00pm until 05:00am over the weekend.
  • Business

Eskom loadshedding at stage 3


Gauteng ANC chair Panyaza Lesufi
  • Politics

Removal of Phalatse will yield similar results in other municipalities: Lesufi


Mandela who advocated for reconciliation, died on this day at his home in Johannesburg at the age of 95.
  • South Africa

67 Blankets for Madiba campaign goes all out to celebrate 9th anniversary


Weather

  • About the SABC
  • Contact Us
  • Jobs
  • Advertise
  • Disclaimer
  • Site Map

SABC © 2022

No Result
View All Result
  • SOUTH AFRICA
  • POLITICS
  • BUSINESS
  • SPORT
  • AFRICA
  • WORLD
  • SCI-TECH
  • LIFESTYLE
  • FEATURES
  • OPINION

© 2022

Previous Omicron-related disruptions cause over 4,000 flight cancellations to kick off 2022
Next ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ Continues Box Office Domination, Crosses $600 Million in North America