Public Health Professor Prof. Yona Amitai passed away last night (Saturday) at the age of 74.
Amitai served, among other positions, as a full professor in the Department of Management, at Bar-Ilan University.
He has been an expert in pediatrics, toxicology, clinical pharmacology and public health.
Seawater desalination plant (illustration),
Prof. Amitai studied medicine in Bologna, Italy, and continued his studies in Israel at the Faculty of Medicine at Tel Aviv University, graduating with honors.
Later, during the Yom Kippur War, he functioned as a physician in the southern arena, in Sinai and across the canal.
After the war he continued to serve as a battalion doctor and a brigade doctor in the reserve, with the rank of major in the Armored Corps.
Even after he was released at the age of 47 from this position, he continued to volunteer as a consultant to the Chief Medical Officer, in the field of toxicology.
In parallel with his military service, Prof. Amitai specialized in pediatrics, and worked in the field as a senior physician at Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus.
He later also headed the Department of Pediatrics at the Faculty of Medicine, Hadassah in Jerusalem.
He also studied toxicology at Boston Children's Hospital, affiliated with Harvard Medical School.
Prof. Amitai was not satisfied with this, and was certified at the Public Health School of the Hebrew University and Hadassah.
Bar Ilan Library and Bar Ilan Campus (illustration), Photo: Gideon Markowitz
In 1997, Amitai was appointed an associate professor of pediatrics at the Hebrew University and Hadassah.
In 2011, he was appointed full professor in the Department of Management (Management of Health Systems in the Public Health Department) at Bar-Ilan University.
At the same time, in the years 1999–2008, he headed the Department of Mother, Child and Adolescent in the Ministry of Health, and was a member of the Board of Public Health Services.
As part of its activities, it was the responsible authority in the Ministry of Health in the field of preventive medicine for children in Israel.
Amitai introduced preventive treatment with folic acid before pregnancy, and in the early stages of pregnancy, to prevent birth defects.
At the same time, he led research in the field of water desalination and its effect on public health, raising the importance of adding magnesium to drinking water in the public agenda.
In addition to his 25 years of working in hospitals, Amitai has worked for many years as a pediatrician in community clinics.
He was the first pediatrician in Elon Moreh in Samaria, and worked in community clinics with Bedouin children in Sinai and the Nabhao Indian tribes in the United States.
From 2005 to 2006, he served as a World Health Organization's toxicology consultant in the care of gypsy children in Kosovo who suffered from lead poisoning following the Balkan Wars.
Amitai has served as a consultant to the international team in the treatment of lead poisoning in children in Nigeria.
He also served alongside Dr. Shlomo Almog as chairman of the Committee of Experts for Determining a Diving Standard for Navy Divers, following the Shamgar Committee.
The committee developed a diving standard adopted by the Director General of the Ministry of Defense in 2009, which allows Navy divers to dive in safe conditions.
In addition, he was a member of the board of directors of the House of Wheels in 2003–2008, and a member of the board of directors of the National Council for Child Welfare.
From 2010 to 2014, he served as chairman of the Scientific Committee of the European Confederation of Pediatricians. Amitai passed away on October 16, 2021, leaving behind a wife, Liora, and five children.
