The director of the corona department at Hadassah Hospital estimates that in the current data there is no other option than closure • "The significant jumps in infection appeared after returning to school" • In the community "
The two significant jumps in infection occurred two weeks after returning to school in the state education system and in the ultra-Orthodox community, the director of the corona department at Hadassah Hospital said today (Thursday), while expressing support for the second closure in light of morbidity data.
Photo: GPO
As you may recall, the total closure will take effect tomorrow due to the increase in corona morbidity in the country and the congestion in hospitals.
However, the government has not yet announced the closure targets.
The only official who commented on this was the Deputy Director General of the Ministry of Health, Professor Itamar Grotto, who said that the goal is to reduce to 7% of positive diagnoses out of all tests per day. Disagreements as to the extent of its tightening.
In a conversation with Israel Today, Professor Dror Mevorach explained that "people should understand that closure is measured only a month after it is done and not immediately at the beginning. Corona is a virus that is incubated and is only discovered later on and therefore does not show immediate improvement. But hermetic closure will stop the deterioration. "Severe deterioration - we are in the first place in the world which is about 500 infected per million inhabitants. We have to go down to one hundred infected per million inhabitants and that means less than a thousand new carriers every day. If there is no closure in our situation, the disease will get out of control."
The director of the Corona department agreed with the claim that the closure also has an infection that occurs in homes, but noted that the data show two significant jumps: two weeks after the ultra-Orthodox public returned to school and two weeks after returning to school in the state education system.
This is in addition to gatherings at weddings, prayers in synagogues and various events that led to the loosening of control of the plague.
"It has to be cut with a sword blow - there is no choice," said Prof. Mevorach, "how effective the closure will be, it's hard to know and everyone will tell you something else. I hope in two weeks we will start to see a decrease in the flow of patients to hospitals as well as daily infections. "Such a drop will allow the system to cope."
"Let them not say it's just older patients"
"I am aware of the difficulties of closure," clarified the director of the corona department at Hadassah, "but I believe that anyone who opposes the closure is betting on human life. True, a lot of people infected with the virus will be asymptomatic and others will fully recover. But enough 3% -2% of "Patients are in a difficult situation so that the system will be in a bad state. That people will not say that it is only elderly and difficult patients. We have patients from the age of 18 to the age of 94. This disease affects everyone, even people who have no medical background."
For her part, Prof. Ronit Calderon-Margalit of the Hebrew University School of Public Health stated that the main goal is to reduce the pressure on hospitals in the country. "The government has not set a numerical target for the success of the closure," said Prof. Calderon-Margalit.
"I understand the purpose of the closure is to produce at the end a decrease in the number of hard and medium patients coming to the hospitals," she said, "Today we have a total of almost a thousand medium and hard patients. It produces a big load on the system. Another success will be if we stay on the same amount of tests and see "A decrease in the percentage of positive results. This parameter is much more important than some carriers find every day because the number is a function of the number of tests."
"Strengthen community physicians"
"Scientifically, closure has success in only one thing, it prevents the collapse of the health system and limits difficult patients," said Prof. Eitan Fried of Sheba Hospital.
"Personally, I wonder about the decision and do not understand it. After all, there are 2,400 respirators in Israel and there are only 164 respirators. There are 40,000 hospital beds in Israel and a total of 1,400 patients are hospitalized from Corona. So why do we need a closure now? I also wonder why in the last 48 hours "Health has stopped publishing occupancy data in the corona departments in Israel. This raises eyebrows and questions."
Professor Ethan Fried is an expert in internal medicine and medical genetics.
Fried, who currently founded and manages the oncogenetics unit at the Sheba Genetics Institute and is a lecturer at Tel Aviv University, emphasized that his remarks reflect only his personal position and not the opinion of the hospital.
"Scientifically, in a study of 50 countries in which a significant nationwide closure was imposed, it was found that in the end the closure did not affect the long-term morbidity rates nor the mortality rates," Prof. Fried added, "therefore there is no scientific logic in this closure. "That's all the experts today. Let people go outside, 67 percent of the infections are done indoors. Let children under the age of nine go to school."
The senior doctor understands that there is concern for the winter and the expected morbidity of the flu, but in his opinion one should wait and then discuss the condition.
"In any case, I think the results from the quarantine will show a drop in carriers to an infection level of 2,000 people and then probably between 400 to 500 new carriers every day," he said.
Following this, Prof. Fried raised the fear of overcrowding in the HMOs.
"It must be said that the vast majority of carriers and patients do not come to the hospitals but face and recover in the community. The health system needs to be strengthened, but not just the hospitals. Personnel must be added to the health funds, to community doctors who deal with the public. These doctors will collapse if there is no reinforcement. "Of manpower, if the system does not back them up, it will create opportunities for them to have a good technological connection with the patients and so on. It is mandatory for the state to invest in the medical system in the community in parallel with the hospitals."
"In my personal opinion," the senior director stressed, "closure is vanity and malice. Politicians should be asked what they mean by this closure? Do they want to reduce the number of people infected, prevent demonstrations, prevent prayers, prevent gatherings? What is the purpose of the whole thing?" .
