The number of new Covid-19 infections in Israel has soared by 459 over the past 24-hours, the Ministry of Health reports - the biggest daily increase since April. This is a 68% increase over the 274 new cases identified in the previous 24 hours, as health officials fear that the exponential growth scenario it has feared is being realized. The government has no intention of returning to lockdown at this stage but rather identifying hotspots where more severe restrictions are being introduced. For the time being various neighborhoods in Tiberias and the ultra-orthodox city of Elad have been declared hotspots while Bat Yam is close to being declared a restricted zone. RELATED ARTICLES New infections mount as Israeli gov't toughens measures The big jump in new cases is not being reflected in very serious cases. On the contrary, the number of people defined as seriously ill fell by five to 40 over the past 24 hours and the number of people on ventilators fell by two to 27. The number of people hospitalized fell by 11 to 189 but the number of fatalities rose by one to 308. Overall there have been 21,512 cases of coronavirus in Israel of which 15,869 have recovered. Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on June 24, 2020 © Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2020
