Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Health Minister Yuli Edelstein were present on Monday morning as the fifth millionth Israeli citizen was vaccinated.

Janet Lavi-Azulay, a 34-year-old pregnant woman from Petach Tikvah, was the fifth millionth Israeli to be vaccinated. She was asked by Kan News if she’s nervous about getting vaccinated while pregnant and she responded: “The risk of the coronavirus is much greater – that’s for sure.”

“We’re working on bringing in tens of millions more vaccines,” Netanyahu said at the event. “Soon we’ll have vaccines approved for children under the age of 16 and we also still have another million Israelis over the age of 16 to be vaccinated. Our estimate is that we’ll vaccinate everyone by April and we’ll emerge from the pandemic. Until then, we need to continue wearing masks and maintain social distancing.”

Netanyahu added that Israel will be building factories in the country to produce vaccines.

Health Minister Yuli Edelstein said that just weeks earlier he wasn’t sure that Israel would ever reach 5 million vaccinated citizens. He added that if Israelis continue to vaccinate and adhere to health regulations, “we’ll sit at the Pesach seder with our extended families. We still haven’t gotten rid of the coronavirus but it will enter the corner and live there quietly and we’ll continue our lives.”

“It’s all in the zechus of the vaccines, those who were vaccinated, and our excellent medical professionals. B’Ezras Hashem, we’ll continue onwards.”

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)