The record number of seriously ill patients hospitalized with Covid-19 is alarming Israel's Ministry of Health. There are currently 441 patients seriously ill with Covid-19 in Israel's hospitals up six from yesterday and steadily rising from 430 on Wednesday. The number of people in on ventilators is 121, up five from yesterday although this is not a record - at one point during the first wave 140 patients were on ventilators.
113,648 people in Israel have been diagnosed with Covid-19 since the start of the pandemic and there are currently 20,151 people ill with the virus. There have been 909 fatalities. On Thursday, 2,066 new cases of Covid-19 were diagnosed in Israel, the first time that the number has risen above 2,000 since early July.
Following this rise in the number of Covid-19 cases, a Ministry of Health source told "Globes" "The system is being overloaded. Although it can continue and we haven't reached the official threshold, but the staff are already overworked and they are being overworked in order to keep the economy going, at this is at the height of the summer. If this is what is happening now, what will the situation be like when we get to the winter?"
In contrast to the first wave when hospitals coped with the Covid-19 pandemic while elective procedures were postponed and the public were deterred from coming to hospitals, medical staff are now required to cope with managing many fronts, and prepare for the coming winter, while Covid-19 infections are not moderating and the number of patients in a serious condition is continuing to grow.
The Ministry of Health points out that treating coronavirus patients in intensive care requires a large number of staff including specially trained and skilled doctors, anesthetists and nurses. Many of the seriously ill Covid-19 patients remain in the hospital for a long time and this will become an even greater challenge in the winter when there will also be all the other seasonal problems like flu, which could combined with Covid-19.
The coronavirus cabinet will again convene this evening to discuss the rise in cases. The last meeting ended in disarray after Minister of Housing and Construction Yaakov Litzman clashed with Prof. Ronni Gamzu who is in charge of the Ministry of Health's campaign to quell the virus over his 'traffic light' plan to impose restrictions of 'red' (high infection) locations. The cabinet must urgently decide on whether students 'red' areas will return to school on September 1.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on August 30, 2020 © Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2020 .