Wake-up call: The
Ministry of Health, which has not opened designated vaccination complexes in schools already in the great freedom.
The Ministry of Education, which has not encouraged enough student immunization and insists on not vaccinating in schools.
And local authorities, who want autonomy in education - but preferred that someone else do the work for them.
Now, everyone is racing against time to ensure the start of the school year.
"The system woke up too late," a senior education official said yesterday.
"Everything is done at the last minute. We are in a race against time and the opening of the year may be in jeopardy."
At the same time, at the beginning of next week, a concluding discussion will be held by the Corona Cabinet on the education system, in which a decision will be made on all issues and aspects.
The decision made at the hearing will be binding on all members of the government.
Many local authorities yesterday opened night vaccination complexes for young people and adolescents, with the goal being one - to lower the proportion of patients and isolates, and to open the school year on September 1 with as many students in the classrooms as possible.
At the moment, the rate of vaccinators is very low.
The latest published data indicate that the rate of vaccinated students in grades 7-9 is only 36%, while the rate of vaccinated students in grades 10-12 is 62%.
Education Minister Shasha Bitton // Photo: Oren Ben Hakon,
One of the decisions that could lead to hundreds of thousands of students starting the school year from home, by distance learning, is that in eighth-twelfth grades in red cities, studies will take place if there are no more than 70% of vaccinated students in the class.
But only at the last minute, the government embarks on an extensive operation against the backdrop of soaring infection data.
There are quite a few factors that arose too late, the main one of which is the Ministry of Education, and also its head - Yifat Shasha Bitton.
For a long time, the minister tried to keep the vaccines away from schools.
The offices fell asleep on guard
However, the Ministry of Health also fell asleep on guard.
Yesterday, the director general of the Ministry of Health signed the order that allows students to be vaccinated during school hours, but the question arises why the Ministry of Health did not act to vaccinate students and teenagers already at the beginning of the big holiday?
Health Minister Horowitz // Photo: Gideon Markovich,
"The responsibility to vaccinate the citizens and students of the State of Israel is under the Ministry of Health," said a source in the Ministry of Education.
He said, "They were called a month ago to act for information and vaccination, so as not to reach September 1 and then remember the last minute. They could have signed the order a long time ago and used the schools."
Meanwhile, a senior Home Front Command official announced that a very large Operation of the Home Front Command will begin in Israel next week, with the Ministries of Health and Education, which aims to conduct serological tests for one million two hundred thousand students aged 12-3 before the start of the school year.
The military will lead the tests with local authorities and government ministries, with the intention of reaching as large a number of students as possible.
Ahead of the operation, a military source who spoke about it said that "our estimate is that in the coming weeks we will see a continuous increase in the infection graphs, when next Tuesday we will reach about 12,000 or more carriers who are discovered every day and 700 seriously ill."
* Assaf Golan participated in the preparation of the article.