Israel’s Health Ministry predicted that the number of seriously ill coronavirus patients will reach 1,000 in three weeks, as the number of active patients reached over 30,000 on Tuesday night, Channel 12 News reported.
The ministry added that Israel’s health system can cope with only 750 seriously ill patients.
The ministry presented the grim prediction at an emergency meeting convened by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and said the data is based on the expected decline of current coronavirus patients, which means that the prediction holds true even if the number of daily cases decreases in the coming days.
According to the report, unnamed sources present at the meeting said that the government is preparing to implement a nationwide lockdown and discussions on the matter will begin on Thursday.
Prof. Dov Schwartz of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev warned on Tuesday that Israel is one step away from catastrophe – almost at the point where intensive-care units will fill up and doctors will have to decide who will live and who will die. He added that Israel has only three weeks to halt the current situation, even if the government implements an immediate full lockdown.
“I represent a group of researchers at Ben-Gurion University, and mathematically, we are only three weeks away from a total collapse,” Prof. Dov Schwartz, former chief scientist for the Israel Atomic Energy Commission, told Ynet.
“We currently have 80 patients connected to ventilators, a number which doubles every ten days, meaning we will have 320 patients on ventilators within three weeks if we keep [the spread] at the same pace.”
Prof. Schwartz explained that the problem is not the lack of ventilators since Israel has enough but the lack of medical staff to operate them.
“A ward with 20 ventilated coronavirus patients requires 20 doctors and 90 nurses. We thought that towards the winter we will be able to train additional staff, which we recommended the government adds, but now it seems to not be possible.”
Prof. Schwartz believes a nationwide lockdown is necessary but adds that if the government is reluctant to implement one due to its harm to the economy, then at least only essential industries must remain open and a lockdown should be implemented in the evenings and weekends.
“Lockdown is the right mathematical option, it has been proven as an effective method to minimize the number of those contracting the virus and patients in serious condition,” Schwartz said, adding that elderly Israelis and other high-risk groups should voluntarily stay home for the next month.
Schwartz slammed the government for wasting valuable time on never-ending discussions on non-essential activities such as gyms, pools and restaurants.
“If there is no proof the place is harmless, it should not be open!” he said. “Therefore: no pools, no restaurants, no shuls and no gyms.”
(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)
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2 Responses
every other prediction has been wrong so we will see
Tragic that they didn’t follow Dr. Zelenko’s amazing ingenious advice.