All The News Anti-Israel Posters Will Not Read Or Discuss 2

[Stuartbirdan2]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

Jewish fascists

Space laser fascists!

Thanks for proving you have no actual argument,
indeed the headline said it would be too smart for you.

Consider first the case of an Israeli named Ami Popper. In May 1990, two years after the original publication of this book, Popper put on his army uniform and asked men waiting at a bus stop in a southern Israeli town for their identity cards. After confirming they were Arabs he lined them up and opened fire, killing seven. Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir immediately declared that the killings had no political significance, but were instead the act of a "deranged individual." Popper, however, was found sane and fit to stand trial. He is now serving a long prison sentence for murder and recently married the adopted daughter of Rabbi Meir Kahane's son, Benjamin Kahane, leader of the Kahane Chai (Kahane Lives) movement. Popper's sentence is the subject of regular appeals by settlers and other Jewish fundamentalists who demand his release as a "political prisoner."

Approximately six years later, on February 28, 1994, Dr. Baruch Goldstein woke up early in Kiryat Arba, an Israeli settlement on the West Bank near the ancient Jewish town and contemporary Palestinian Arab city of Hebron. Goldstein was an American Jewish immigrant to Israel also affiliated to Meir Kahane's organization. The previous day he had meticulously updated his patients' files and composed a farewell note to his coworkers thanking them for the opportunity to work with them toward the fulfillment of the "complete redemption." He donned his army uniform, picked up his assault rifle and several clips of ammunition, and went to the Tomb of the Patriarchs in the center of Hebron, where Abraham (Ibrahim to Muslims) is believed buried.

With a marksman's headset protecting his ears Goldstein brushed aside the unarmed Arab guard and entered the portion of the site reserved as a mosque. The room was packed with Muslims reciting their prayers for the holy month of Ramadan. Goldstein pointed his gun and began killing the kneeling men and boys. When his gun jammed he was beaten to death by desperate survivors, but not before he had shot twenty-nine people to death, wounded dozens more, and unleashed a torrent of violence that seriously jeopardized the budding peace process.

For The Land and The Lord: Preface

www.sas.upenn.edu

"We feel that [Baruch] Goldstein took a preventative measure against yet another Arab attack on Jews. We understand his motivation, his grief and his actions. And we are not ashamed to say that Goldstein was a charter member of the Jewish Defense League

You are being redirected...

www.adl.org

 

[Indeependent]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

NEWSLETTER

COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Israel: Successes, lessons, and caveats
Israel is a world leader in the race to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine. In this Special Feature, Medical News Today look at why the vaccine rollout has been so successful in Israel and discuss the controversies and equity issues related to the campaign.

EMMANUEL DUNAND/Getty Images
All data and statistics are based on publicly available data at the time of publication. Some information may be out of date. Visit our coronavirus hub and follow our live updates page for the most recent information on the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the United States has struggled to meet COVID-19 vaccine rollout goals, within just 2 weeks, Israel vaccinated almost 15% of the country’s population of more than 9 million.

As of January 19, 2021, 25.6% of the Israeli population have received their first vaccine dose, and 550,000 people have received both doses.

To give some perspective, Israel is vaccinating residents at a rate of 32.4 people per 100, compared with 4.8 people per 100 in the U.S., and 7 per 100 in the United Kingdom.

But why exactly has the rollout been so successful in Israel? And what can we learn from this early success? In this Special Feature, we review what is known about Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Early rollout successes
Israel’s success in rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine seems to be due to several factors influencing the access to and distribution of the vaccine.

The Israeli government started searching early on for a way to secure vaccine doses.

In June 2020, Israel became one of the first countries to sign a purchase agreement for a vaccine supply from Moderna. In November, the country announced additional vaccine deals with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

The first Pfizer vaccine doses arrived in Israel on December 9, 2020, and vaccinations began on December 19, 2020. The country is still waiting for the other two vaccines.

Israel’s government also allegedly agreed to pay top dollar for vaccines and purchase millions of doses. Although the exact price is unknown, one official said that the price was about $30 per vaccine — double the average price abroad.

The makers of the vaccine that Israel is currently using — U.S. company Pfizer and German partner BioNTech — would not comment on the cost of the vaccine.

In exchange for an early, steady vaccine supply, the Israeli government also assured Pfizer that the country’s rollout would offer quick, large-scale results, promising to give the company detailed patient information on those receiving the vaccine in Israel.

Israeli officials expected Israel’s vaccine rollout to be successful because the country is small but has a vast healthcare infrastructure. The country also has a well-developed, universal healthcare system that connects all residents to a national digital health network.

All residents also have insurance from semi-private healthcare maintenance organizations (HMOs) that run services throughout the country, even in rural, remote regions.

Israel’s centralized, digitized system makes it easier to track and access information and roll out national healthcare agendas, such as vaccination campaigns.

“In a sense, Israel has become like a very large clinical trial,” Hadassah Medical Center virologist Dr. Rivka Abulafia-Lapid told The Times of Israel.

“Because everyone in Israel belongs to an HMO, and their records are kept along with their background data, this means we’ll get a good picture of responsiveness to the vaccine, in context of age, gender, and existing medical conditions,” Dr. Abulafia-Lapid added.


Distribution successes
Israel’s vaccine rollout success is also due in part to the handling of the vaccine and its delivery to citizens.

Those responsible for logistics have stored the vaccine doses underground near Israel’s main airport. They are in 30 large freezers, which are capable of holding 5 million doses.

Teams in Israel have also developed a way to repack doses from large, ultra-frozen pallets into insulated boxes roughly the size of a pizza box. Doing this has made it easier to distribute vaccine doses in smaller numbers and to remote sites.

Teams repack large vaccine pallets into bundles containing as few as 100 doses, which they then deliver to 400 vaccination centers. Healthcare professionals have also managed to obtain more vaccine doses out of each vial than Pfizer had initially advertised.

Pfizer have approved both of these processes.

Some 335 drive-through vaccination clinics also exist throughout Israel, allowing healthcare professionals to vaccinate larger groups of people quickly. On January 19, 2021, the country announced a new daily record of more than 210,000 vaccinations in 1 day.

Israel began vaccinating healthcare workers, teachers, people with medical conditions, and those over the age of 60 years. Now, the country is racing to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 years — equating to about 5.2 million people — by the end of March. As of January 20, Israel has started vaccinating residents over the age of 40 years.

At the time of writing, Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to more than 76% of the country’s inhabitants who work as teachers, are over the age of 60 years, or have health risks.


ADVERTISING

CORONAVIRUS NEWS
Stay informed about COVID-19
Get the latest updates and research-backed information on the novel coronavirus direct to your inbox.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Controversies
Despite these achievements, some people in Israel are regularly demonstrating against the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Hailed as a way to restore normalcy — and save the economy — the government calls the COVID-19 vaccine rollout “Operation Back to Life.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that it will allow Israel to become the first country in the world to emerge from the pandemic.

However, it is less clear precisely how and when Israel will be able to revert to so-called normal life.

On January 19, the country reported a record high of more than 10,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day and a positivity rate above 10% for the first time in 3 months. Also, 30–40% of new cases are linked to the new COVID-19 variant that scientists first recognized in the U.K.

Israeli, currently in its third lockdown, also faces high levels of unemployment and a recession, but the authorities have extended the current nationwide lockdown until at least January 31.

Netanyahu’s political opponents also accuse the government of using the vaccine campaign for political gain before the upcoming election.

The country is on track to vaccinate everyone over the age of 16 years just 3 days before the election on March 23. In addition, the government is discussing postponing the election if infection rates stay high.

The government is also receiving criticism for not sharing enough details about what patient data it will share or how Pfizer will use the information.

Government officials only recently disclosed some terms of the deal, claiming that it will only share general data with Pfizer, such as data about the numbers of cases, serious cases, fatalities, and vaccinations, and each individual’s age and gender.

They also say that the data will help researchers assess and track herd immunity, with the results to feature in a recognized medical journal.

But Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, expressed her worries that anonymized patient data, including complete medical histories, will be shared.

Although they will not bear patient names or identifying markers, she said that it is possible to de-anonymize the files. Treating these personal data as though they belong to the government in this way is “not ethically, not legally, and not morally

,” she added.


MEDICAL NEWS TODAY NEWSLETTER
Knowledge is power. Get our free daily newsletter.
Dig deeper into the health topics you care about most. Subscribe to our facts-first newsletter today.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Health equity issues
According to human rights groups, Palestinians living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip do not have access to the vaccine and will not for a long time. Under the 4th Geneva Convention, occupying forces must provide healthcare to the populations of the territories they occupy.

Yet Palestinian officials seem reluctant to make a formal request to Israel to provide the vaccine, likely because asking for help from Israel is politically sensitive.

Also, the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s, which were meant to be a temporary road map to develop a Palestinian state, gave Palestinians responsibility for their healthcare.

Israel’s health minister reportedly told Sky News that the Palestinians simply need to “learn how to take care of themselves.”

He said that Israel has provided advice, supplies, and medicine to its neighbors, adding that it is in Israel’s best interest to reduce Palestinian case numbers, as many Palestinians work in Israel.

But some international organizations condemn Israel’s failure to provide the vaccine equitably.

According to Saleh Higazi, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director:

“Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program highlights the institutionalized discrimination that defines the Israeli government’s policy toward Palestinians. There could hardly be a better illustration of how Israeli lives are valued above Palestinian ones.”

The Palestinian government has arranged for vaccine shipments from four companies that should arrive this quarter. The state may also start receiving doses in February from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine schemeTrusted Source for low-to-middle-income countries.

Another issue complicating the vaccine rollout is the reluctance and fear among the country’s Arab and Orthodox populations regarding the vaccine and pandemic restrictions.

Vaccination rates are low among the Arab community in Israel.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are registering record high numbers of new cases of COVID-19. There are also reports of lax preventive restrictions in these communities, with some schools remaining open and multiple reports of large gatherings.

On January 20, the government announced the launch of a campaign to educate the Ultra-Orthodox community about pandemic risks and the importance of following the rules.​

All the billions given to the "Palis" and they can't get vaccines?

Billions?

I presume you can count what we and the UN have given the "Palis" since the 50s.

No link provided

The fact that you need to be spoon fed a link shows how mentally ill you are.
Google US aid to Palestinians.

 

[Indeependent]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

NEWSLETTER

COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Israel: Successes, lessons, and caveats
Israel is a world leader in the race to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine. In this Special Feature, Medical News Today look at why the vaccine rollout has been so successful in Israel and discuss the controversies and equity issues related to the campaign.

EMMANUEL DUNAND/Getty Images
All data and statistics are based on publicly available data at the time of publication. Some information may be out of date. Visit our coronavirus hub and follow our live updates page for the most recent information on the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the United States has struggled to meet COVID-19 vaccine rollout goals, within just 2 weeks, Israel vaccinated almost 15% of the country’s population of more than 9 million.

As of January 19, 2021, 25.6% of the Israeli population have received their first vaccine dose, and 550,000 people have received both doses.

To give some perspective, Israel is vaccinating residents at a rate of 32.4 people per 100, compared with 4.8 people per 100 in the U.S., and 7 per 100 in the United Kingdom.

But why exactly has the rollout been so successful in Israel? And what can we learn from this early success? In this Special Feature, we review what is known about Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Early rollout successes
Israel’s success in rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine seems to be due to several factors influencing the access to and distribution of the vaccine.

The Israeli government started searching early on for a way to secure vaccine doses.

In June 2020, Israel became one of the first countries to sign a purchase agreement for a vaccine supply from Moderna. In November, the country announced additional vaccine deals with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

The first Pfizer vaccine doses arrived in Israel on December 9, 2020, and vaccinations began on December 19, 2020. The country is still waiting for the other two vaccines.

Israel’s government also allegedly agreed to pay top dollar for vaccines and purchase millions of doses. Although the exact price is unknown, one official said that the price was about $30 per vaccine — double the average price abroad.

The makers of the vaccine that Israel is currently using — U.S. company Pfizer and German partner BioNTech — would not comment on the cost of the vaccine.

In exchange for an early, steady vaccine supply, the Israeli government also assured Pfizer that the country’s rollout would offer quick, large-scale results, promising to give the company detailed patient information on those receiving the vaccine in Israel.

Israeli officials expected Israel’s vaccine rollout to be successful because the country is small but has a vast healthcare infrastructure. The country also has a well-developed, universal healthcare system that connects all residents to a national digital health network.

All residents also have insurance from semi-private healthcare maintenance organizations (HMOs) that run services throughout the country, even in rural, remote regions.

Israel’s centralized, digitized system makes it easier to track and access information and roll out national healthcare agendas, such as vaccination campaigns.

“In a sense, Israel has become like a very large clinical trial,” Hadassah Medical Center virologist Dr. Rivka Abulafia-Lapid told The Times of Israel.

“Because everyone in Israel belongs to an HMO, and their records are kept along with their background data, this means we’ll get a good picture of responsiveness to the vaccine, in context of age, gender, and existing medical conditions,” Dr. Abulafia-Lapid added.


Distribution successes
Israel’s vaccine rollout success is also due in part to the handling of the vaccine and its delivery to citizens.

Those responsible for logistics have stored the vaccine doses underground near Israel’s main airport. They are in 30 large freezers, which are capable of holding 5 million doses.

Teams in Israel have also developed a way to repack doses from large, ultra-frozen pallets into insulated boxes roughly the size of a pizza box. Doing this has made it easier to distribute vaccine doses in smaller numbers and to remote sites.

Teams repack large vaccine pallets into bundles containing as few as 100 doses, which they then deliver to 400 vaccination centers. Healthcare professionals have also managed to obtain more vaccine doses out of each vial than Pfizer had initially advertised.

Pfizer have approved both of these processes.

Some 335 drive-through vaccination clinics also exist throughout Israel, allowing healthcare professionals to vaccinate larger groups of people quickly. On January 19, 2021, the country announced a new daily record of more than 210,000 vaccinations in 1 day.

Israel began vaccinating healthcare workers, teachers, people with medical conditions, and those over the age of 60 years. Now, the country is racing to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 years — equating to about 5.2 million people — by the end of March. As of January 20, Israel has started vaccinating residents over the age of 40 years.

At the time of writing, Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to more than 76% of the country’s inhabitants who work as teachers, are over the age of 60 years, or have health risks.


ADVERTISING

CORONAVIRUS NEWS
Stay informed about COVID-19
Get the latest updates and research-backed information on the novel coronavirus direct to your inbox.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Controversies
Despite these achievements, some people in Israel are regularly demonstrating against the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Hailed as a way to restore normalcy — and save the economy — the government calls the COVID-19 vaccine rollout “Operation Back to Life.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that it will allow Israel to become the first country in the world to emerge from the pandemic.

However, it is less clear precisely how and when Israel will be able to revert to so-called normal life.

On January 19, the country reported a record high of more than 10,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day and a positivity rate above 10% for the first time in 3 months. Also, 30–40% of new cases are linked to the new COVID-19 variant that scientists first recognized in the U.K.

Israeli, currently in its third lockdown, also faces high levels of unemployment and a recession, but the authorities have extended the current nationwide lockdown until at least January 31.

Netanyahu’s political opponents also accuse the government of using the vaccine campaign for political gain before the upcoming election.

The country is on track to vaccinate everyone over the age of 16 years just 3 days before the election on March 23. In addition, the government is discussing postponing the election if infection rates stay high.

The government is also receiving criticism for not sharing enough details about what patient data it will share or how Pfizer will use the information.

Government officials only recently disclosed some terms of the deal, claiming that it will only share general data with Pfizer, such as data about the numbers of cases, serious cases, fatalities, and vaccinations, and each individual’s age and gender.

They also say that the data will help researchers assess and track herd immunity, with the results to feature in a recognized medical journal.

But Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, expressed her worries that anonymized patient data, including complete medical histories, will be shared.

Although they will not bear patient names or identifying markers, she said that it is possible to de-anonymize the files. Treating these personal data as though they belong to the government in this way is “not ethically, not legally, and not morally

,” she added.


MEDICAL NEWS TODAY NEWSLETTER
Knowledge is power. Get our free daily newsletter.
Dig deeper into the health topics you care about most. Subscribe to our facts-first newsletter today.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Health equity issues
According to human rights groups, Palestinians living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip do not have access to the vaccine and will not for a long time. Under the 4th Geneva Convention, occupying forces must provide healthcare to the populations of the territories they occupy.

Yet Palestinian officials seem reluctant to make a formal request to Israel to provide the vaccine, likely because asking for help from Israel is politically sensitive.

Also, the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s, which were meant to be a temporary road map to develop a Palestinian state, gave Palestinians responsibility for their healthcare.

Israel’s health minister reportedly told Sky News that the Palestinians simply need to “learn how to take care of themselves.”

He said that Israel has provided advice, supplies, and medicine to its neighbors, adding that it is in Israel’s best interest to reduce Palestinian case numbers, as many Palestinians work in Israel.

But some international organizations condemn Israel’s failure to provide the vaccine equitably.

According to Saleh Higazi, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director:

“Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program highlights the institutionalized discrimination that defines the Israeli government’s policy toward Palestinians. There could hardly be a better illustration of how Israeli lives are valued above Palestinian ones.”

The Palestinian government has arranged for vaccine shipments from four companies that should arrive this quarter. The state may also start receiving doses in February from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine schemeTrusted Source for low-to-middle-income countries.

Another issue complicating the vaccine rollout is the reluctance and fear among the country’s Arab and Orthodox populations regarding the vaccine and pandemic restrictions.

Vaccination rates are low among the Arab community in Israel.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are registering record high numbers of new cases of COVID-19. There are also reports of lax preventive restrictions in these communities, with some schools remaining open and multiple reports of large gatherings.

On January 20, the government announced the launch of a campaign to educate the Ultra-Orthodox community about pandemic risks and the importance of following the rules.​

All the billions given to the "Palis" and they can't get vaccines?

Billions?

I presume you can count what we and the UN have given the "Palis" since the 50s.

USA TODAY

www.usatoday.com

How much aid does the U.S. give Israel?
The United States has given Israel a total of $146 billion in bilateral assistance and missile defense funding through 2020, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), which provides nonpartisan research to lawmakers. That makes it the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign aid since World War II. (Other top recipients include Egypt and Afghanistan.

Israel has spent every penny building a state of the art nation that doesn’t need to beg for resources from other nations.

 

[Stuartbirdan2]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

NEWSLETTER

COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Israel: Successes, lessons, and caveats
Israel is a world leader in the race to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine. In this Special Feature, Medical News Today look at why the vaccine rollout has been so successful in Israel and discuss the controversies and equity issues related to the campaign.

EMMANUEL DUNAND/Getty Images
All data and statistics are based on publicly available data at the time of publication. Some information may be out of date. Visit our coronavirus hub and follow our live updates page for the most recent information on the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the United States has struggled to meet COVID-19 vaccine rollout goals, within just 2 weeks, Israel vaccinated almost 15% of the country’s population of more than 9 million.

As of January 19, 2021, 25.6% of the Israeli population have received their first vaccine dose, and 550,000 people have received both doses.

To give some perspective, Israel is vaccinating residents at a rate of 32.4 people per 100, compared with 4.8 people per 100 in the U.S., and 7 per 100 in the United Kingdom.

But why exactly has the rollout been so successful in Israel? And what can we learn from this early success? In this Special Feature, we review what is known about Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Early rollout successes
Israel’s success in rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine seems to be due to several factors influencing the access to and distribution of the vaccine.

The Israeli government started searching early on for a way to secure vaccine doses.

In June 2020, Israel became one of the first countries to sign a purchase agreement for a vaccine supply from Moderna. In November, the country announced additional vaccine deals with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

The first Pfizer vaccine doses arrived in Israel on December 9, 2020, and vaccinations began on December 19, 2020. The country is still waiting for the other two vaccines.

Israel’s government also allegedly agreed to pay top dollar for vaccines and purchase millions of doses. Although the exact price is unknown, one official said that the price was about $30 per vaccine — double the average price abroad.

The makers of the vaccine that Israel is currently using — U.S. company Pfizer and German partner BioNTech — would not comment on the cost of the vaccine.

In exchange for an early, steady vaccine supply, the Israeli government also assured Pfizer that the country’s rollout would offer quick, large-scale results, promising to give the company detailed patient information on those receiving the vaccine in Israel.

Israeli officials expected Israel’s vaccine rollout to be successful because the country is small but has a vast healthcare infrastructure. The country also has a well-developed, universal healthcare system that connects all residents to a national digital health network.

All residents also have insurance from semi-private healthcare maintenance organizations (HMOs) that run services throughout the country, even in rural, remote regions.

Israel’s centralized, digitized system makes it easier to track and access information and roll out national healthcare agendas, such as vaccination campaigns.

“In a sense, Israel has become like a very large clinical trial,” Hadassah Medical Center virologist Dr. Rivka Abulafia-Lapid told The Times of Israel.

“Because everyone in Israel belongs to an HMO, and their records are kept along with their background data, this means we’ll get a good picture of responsiveness to the vaccine, in context of age, gender, and existing medical conditions,” Dr. Abulafia-Lapid added.


Distribution successes
Israel’s vaccine rollout success is also due in part to the handling of the vaccine and its delivery to citizens.

Those responsible for logistics have stored the vaccine doses underground near Israel’s main airport. They are in 30 large freezers, which are capable of holding 5 million doses.

Teams in Israel have also developed a way to repack doses from large, ultra-frozen pallets into insulated boxes roughly the size of a pizza box. Doing this has made it easier to distribute vaccine doses in smaller numbers and to remote sites.

Teams repack large vaccine pallets into bundles containing as few as 100 doses, which they then deliver to 400 vaccination centers. Healthcare professionals have also managed to obtain more vaccine doses out of each vial than Pfizer had initially advertised.

Pfizer have approved both of these processes.

Some 335 drive-through vaccination clinics also exist throughout Israel, allowing healthcare professionals to vaccinate larger groups of people quickly. On January 19, 2021, the country announced a new daily record of more than 210,000 vaccinations in 1 day.

Israel began vaccinating healthcare workers, teachers, people with medical conditions, and those over the age of 60 years. Now, the country is racing to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 years — equating to about 5.2 million people — by the end of March. As of January 20, Israel has started vaccinating residents over the age of 40 years.

At the time of writing, Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to more than 76% of the country’s inhabitants who work as teachers, are over the age of 60 years, or have health risks.


ADVERTISING

CORONAVIRUS NEWS
Stay informed about COVID-19
Get the latest updates and research-backed information on the novel coronavirus direct to your inbox.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Controversies
Despite these achievements, some people in Israel are regularly demonstrating against the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Hailed as a way to restore normalcy — and save the economy — the government calls the COVID-19 vaccine rollout “Operation Back to Life.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that it will allow Israel to become the first country in the world to emerge from the pandemic.

However, it is less clear precisely how and when Israel will be able to revert to so-called normal life.

On January 19, the country reported a record high of more than 10,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day and a positivity rate above 10% for the first time in 3 months. Also, 30–40% of new cases are linked to the new COVID-19 variant that scientists first recognized in the U.K.

Israeli, currently in its third lockdown, also faces high levels of unemployment and a recession, but the authorities have extended the current nationwide lockdown until at least January 31.

Netanyahu’s political opponents also accuse the government of using the vaccine campaign for political gain before the upcoming election.

The country is on track to vaccinate everyone over the age of 16 years just 3 days before the election on March 23. In addition, the government is discussing postponing the election if infection rates stay high.

The government is also receiving criticism for not sharing enough details about what patient data it will share or how Pfizer will use the information.

Government officials only recently disclosed some terms of the deal, claiming that it will only share general data with Pfizer, such as data about the numbers of cases, serious cases, fatalities, and vaccinations, and each individual’s age and gender.

They also say that the data will help researchers assess and track herd immunity, with the results to feature in a recognized medical journal.

But Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, expressed her worries that anonymized patient data, including complete medical histories, will be shared.

Although they will not bear patient names or identifying markers, she said that it is possible to de-anonymize the files. Treating these personal data as though they belong to the government in this way is “not ethically, not legally, and not morally

,” she added.


MEDICAL NEWS TODAY NEWSLETTER
Knowledge is power. Get our free daily newsletter.
Dig deeper into the health topics you care about most. Subscribe to our facts-first newsletter today.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Health equity issues
According to human rights groups, Palestinians living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip do not have access to the vaccine and will not for a long time. Under the 4th Geneva Convention, occupying forces must provide healthcare to the populations of the territories they occupy.

Yet Palestinian officials seem reluctant to make a formal request to Israel to provide the vaccine, likely because asking for help from Israel is politically sensitive.

Also, the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s, which were meant to be a temporary road map to develop a Palestinian state, gave Palestinians responsibility for their healthcare.

Israel’s health minister reportedly told Sky News that the Palestinians simply need to “learn how to take care of themselves.”

He said that Israel has provided advice, supplies, and medicine to its neighbors, adding that it is in Israel’s best interest to reduce Palestinian case numbers, as many Palestinians work in Israel.

But some international organizations condemn Israel’s failure to provide the vaccine equitably.

According to Saleh Higazi, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director:

“Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program highlights the institutionalized discrimination that defines the Israeli government’s policy toward Palestinians. There could hardly be a better illustration of how Israeli lives are valued above Palestinian ones.”

The Palestinian government has arranged for vaccine shipments from four companies that should arrive this quarter. The state may also start receiving doses in February from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine schemeTrusted Source for low-to-middle-income countries.

Another issue complicating the vaccine rollout is the reluctance and fear among the country’s Arab and Orthodox populations regarding the vaccine and pandemic restrictions.

Vaccination rates are low among the Arab community in Israel.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are registering record high numbers of new cases of COVID-19. There are also reports of lax preventive restrictions in these communities, with some schools remaining open and multiple reports of large gatherings.

On January 20, the government announced the launch of a campaign to educate the Ultra-Orthodox community about pandemic risks and the importance of following the rules.​

All the billions given to the "Palis" and they can't get vaccines?

Billions?

I presume you can count what we and the UN have given the "Palis" since the 50s.

No link provided

The fact that you need to be spoon fed a link shows how mentally ill you are.
Google US aid to Palestinians.

I am not responsible for backing up your assertions

 

[Stuartbirdan2]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

NEWSLETTER

COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Israel: Successes, lessons, and caveats
Israel is a world leader in the race to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine. In this Special Feature, Medical News Today look at why the vaccine rollout has been so successful in Israel and discuss the controversies and equity issues related to the campaign.

EMMANUEL DUNAND/Getty Images
All data and statistics are based on publicly available data at the time of publication. Some information may be out of date. Visit our coronavirus hub and follow our live updates page for the most recent information on the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the United States has struggled to meet COVID-19 vaccine rollout goals, within just 2 weeks, Israel vaccinated almost 15% of the country’s population of more than 9 million.

As of January 19, 2021, 25.6% of the Israeli population have received their first vaccine dose, and 550,000 people have received both doses.

To give some perspective, Israel is vaccinating residents at a rate of 32.4 people per 100, compared with 4.8 people per 100 in the U.S., and 7 per 100 in the United Kingdom.

But why exactly has the rollout been so successful in Israel? And what can we learn from this early success? In this Special Feature, we review what is known about Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Early rollout successes
Israel’s success in rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine seems to be due to several factors influencing the access to and distribution of the vaccine.

The Israeli government started searching early on for a way to secure vaccine doses.

In June 2020, Israel became one of the first countries to sign a purchase agreement for a vaccine supply from Moderna. In November, the country announced additional vaccine deals with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

The first Pfizer vaccine doses arrived in Israel on December 9, 2020, and vaccinations began on December 19, 2020. The country is still waiting for the other two vaccines.

Israel’s government also allegedly agreed to pay top dollar for vaccines and purchase millions of doses. Although the exact price is unknown, one official said that the price was about $30 per vaccine — double the average price abroad.

The makers of the vaccine that Israel is currently using — U.S. company Pfizer and German partner BioNTech — would not comment on the cost of the vaccine.

In exchange for an early, steady vaccine supply, the Israeli government also assured Pfizer that the country’s rollout would offer quick, large-scale results, promising to give the company detailed patient information on those receiving the vaccine in Israel.

Israeli officials expected Israel’s vaccine rollout to be successful because the country is small but has a vast healthcare infrastructure. The country also has a well-developed, universal healthcare system that connects all residents to a national digital health network.

All residents also have insurance from semi-private healthcare maintenance organizations (HMOs) that run services throughout the country, even in rural, remote regions.

Israel’s centralized, digitized system makes it easier to track and access information and roll out national healthcare agendas, such as vaccination campaigns.

“In a sense, Israel has become like a very large clinical trial,” Hadassah Medical Center virologist Dr. Rivka Abulafia-Lapid told The Times of Israel.

“Because everyone in Israel belongs to an HMO, and their records are kept along with their background data, this means we’ll get a good picture of responsiveness to the vaccine, in context of age, gender, and existing medical conditions,” Dr. Abulafia-Lapid added.


Distribution successes
Israel’s vaccine rollout success is also due in part to the handling of the vaccine and its delivery to citizens.

Those responsible for logistics have stored the vaccine doses underground near Israel’s main airport. They are in 30 large freezers, which are capable of holding 5 million doses.

Teams in Israel have also developed a way to repack doses from large, ultra-frozen pallets into insulated boxes roughly the size of a pizza box. Doing this has made it easier to distribute vaccine doses in smaller numbers and to remote sites.

Teams repack large vaccine pallets into bundles containing as few as 100 doses, which they then deliver to 400 vaccination centers. Healthcare professionals have also managed to obtain more vaccine doses out of each vial than Pfizer had initially advertised.

Pfizer have approved both of these processes.

Some 335 drive-through vaccination clinics also exist throughout Israel, allowing healthcare professionals to vaccinate larger groups of people quickly. On January 19, 2021, the country announced a new daily record of more than 210,000 vaccinations in 1 day.

Israel began vaccinating healthcare workers, teachers, people with medical conditions, and those over the age of 60 years. Now, the country is racing to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 years — equating to about 5.2 million people — by the end of March. As of January 20, Israel has started vaccinating residents over the age of 40 years.

At the time of writing, Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to more than 76% of the country’s inhabitants who work as teachers, are over the age of 60 years, or have health risks.


ADVERTISING

CORONAVIRUS NEWS
Stay informed about COVID-19
Get the latest updates and research-backed information on the novel coronavirus direct to your inbox.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Controversies
Despite these achievements, some people in Israel are regularly demonstrating against the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Hailed as a way to restore normalcy — and save the economy — the government calls the COVID-19 vaccine rollout “Operation Back to Life.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that it will allow Israel to become the first country in the world to emerge from the pandemic.

However, it is less clear precisely how and when Israel will be able to revert to so-called normal life.

On January 19, the country reported a record high of more than 10,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day and a positivity rate above 10% for the first time in 3 months. Also, 30–40% of new cases are linked to the new COVID-19 variant that scientists first recognized in the U.K.

Israeli, currently in its third lockdown, also faces high levels of unemployment and a recession, but the authorities have extended the current nationwide lockdown until at least January 31.

Netanyahu’s political opponents also accuse the government of using the vaccine campaign for political gain before the upcoming election.

The country is on track to vaccinate everyone over the age of 16 years just 3 days before the election on March 23. In addition, the government is discussing postponing the election if infection rates stay high.

The government is also receiving criticism for not sharing enough details about what patient data it will share or how Pfizer will use the information.

Government officials only recently disclosed some terms of the deal, claiming that it will only share general data with Pfizer, such as data about the numbers of cases, serious cases, fatalities, and vaccinations, and each individual’s age and gender.

They also say that the data will help researchers assess and track herd immunity, with the results to feature in a recognized medical journal.

But Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, expressed her worries that anonymized patient data, including complete medical histories, will be shared.

Although they will not bear patient names or identifying markers, she said that it is possible to de-anonymize the files. Treating these personal data as though they belong to the government in this way is “not ethically, not legally, and not morally

,” she added.


MEDICAL NEWS TODAY NEWSLETTER
Knowledge is power. Get our free daily newsletter.
Dig deeper into the health topics you care about most. Subscribe to our facts-first newsletter today.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Health equity issues
According to human rights groups, Palestinians living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip do not have access to the vaccine and will not for a long time. Under the 4th Geneva Convention, occupying forces must provide healthcare to the populations of the territories they occupy.

Yet Palestinian officials seem reluctant to make a formal request to Israel to provide the vaccine, likely because asking for help from Israel is politically sensitive.

Also, the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s, which were meant to be a temporary road map to develop a Palestinian state, gave Palestinians responsibility for their healthcare.

Israel’s health minister reportedly told Sky News that the Palestinians simply need to “learn how to take care of themselves.”

He said that Israel has provided advice, supplies, and medicine to its neighbors, adding that it is in Israel’s best interest to reduce Palestinian case numbers, as many Palestinians work in Israel.

But some international organizations condemn Israel’s failure to provide the vaccine equitably.

According to Saleh Higazi, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director:

“Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program highlights the institutionalized discrimination that defines the Israeli government’s policy toward Palestinians. There could hardly be a better illustration of how Israeli lives are valued above Palestinian ones.”

The Palestinian government has arranged for vaccine shipments from four companies that should arrive this quarter. The state may also start receiving doses in February from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine schemeTrusted Source for low-to-middle-income countries.

Another issue complicating the vaccine rollout is the reluctance and fear among the country’s Arab and Orthodox populations regarding the vaccine and pandemic restrictions.

Vaccination rates are low among the Arab community in Israel.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are registering record high numbers of new cases of COVID-19. There are also reports of lax preventive restrictions in these communities, with some schools remaining open and multiple reports of large gatherings.

On January 20, the government announced the launch of a campaign to educate the Ultra-Orthodox community about pandemic risks and the importance of following the rules.​

All the billions given to the "Palis" and they can't get vaccines?

Billions?

I presume you can count what we and the UN have given the "Palis" since the 50s.

USA TODAY

www.usatoday.com

How much aid does the U.S. give Israel?
The United States has given Israel a total of $146 billion in bilateral assistance and missile defense funding through 2020, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), which provides nonpartisan research to lawmakers. That makes it the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign aid since World War II. (Other top recipients include Egypt and Afghanistan.

Israel has spent every penny building a state of the art nation that doesn’t need to beg for resources from other nations.

It's called welfare

 

[TheDefiantOne]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

NEWSLETTER

COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Israel: Successes, lessons, and caveats
Israel is a world leader in the race to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine. In this Special Feature, Medical News Today look at why the vaccine rollout has been so successful in Israel and discuss the controversies and equity issues related to the campaign.

EMMANUEL DUNAND/Getty Images
All data and statistics are based on publicly available data at the time of publication. Some information may be out of date. Visit our coronavirus hub and follow our live updates page for the most recent information on the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the United States has struggled to meet COVID-19 vaccine rollout goals, within just 2 weeks, Israel vaccinated almost 15% of the country’s population of more than 9 million.

As of January 19, 2021, 25.6% of the Israeli population have received their first vaccine dose, and 550,000 people have received both doses.

To give some perspective, Israel is vaccinating residents at a rate of 32.4 people per 100, compared with 4.8 people per 100 in the U.S., and 7 per 100 in the United Kingdom.

But why exactly has the rollout been so successful in Israel? And what can we learn from this early success? In this Special Feature, we review what is known about Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Early rollout successes
Israel’s success in rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine seems to be due to several factors influencing the access to and distribution of the vaccine.

The Israeli government started searching early on for a way to secure vaccine doses.

In June 2020, Israel became one of the first countries to sign a purchase agreement for a vaccine supply from Moderna. In November, the country announced additional vaccine deals with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

The first Pfizer vaccine doses arrived in Israel on December 9, 2020, and vaccinations began on December 19, 2020. The country is still waiting for the other two vaccines.

Israel’s government also allegedly agreed to pay top dollar for vaccines and purchase millions of doses. Although the exact price is unknown, one official said that the price was about $30 per vaccine — double the average price abroad.

The makers of the vaccine that Israel is currently using — U.S. company Pfizer and German partner BioNTech — would not comment on the cost of the vaccine.

In exchange for an early, steady vaccine supply, the Israeli government also assured Pfizer that the country’s rollout would offer quick, large-scale results, promising to give the company detailed patient information on those receiving the vaccine in Israel.

Israeli officials expected Israel’s vaccine rollout to be successful because the country is small but has a vast healthcare infrastructure. The country also has a well-developed, universal healthcare system that connects all residents to a national digital health network.

All residents also have insurance from semi-private healthcare maintenance organizations (HMOs) that run services throughout the country, even in rural, remote regions.

Israel’s centralized, digitized system makes it easier to track and access information and roll out national healthcare agendas, such as vaccination campaigns.

“In a sense, Israel has become like a very large clinical trial,” Hadassah Medical Center virologist Dr. Rivka Abulafia-Lapid told The Times of Israel.

“Because everyone in Israel belongs to an HMO, and their records are kept along with their background data, this means we’ll get a good picture of responsiveness to the vaccine, in context of age, gender, and existing medical conditions,” Dr. Abulafia-Lapid added.


Distribution successes
Israel’s vaccine rollout success is also due in part to the handling of the vaccine and its delivery to citizens.

Those responsible for logistics have stored the vaccine doses underground near Israel’s main airport. They are in 30 large freezers, which are capable of holding 5 million doses.

Teams in Israel have also developed a way to repack doses from large, ultra-frozen pallets into insulated boxes roughly the size of a pizza box. Doing this has made it easier to distribute vaccine doses in smaller numbers and to remote sites.

Teams repack large vaccine pallets into bundles containing as few as 100 doses, which they then deliver to 400 vaccination centers. Healthcare professionals have also managed to obtain more vaccine doses out of each vial than Pfizer had initially advertised.

Pfizer have approved both of these processes.

Some 335 drive-through vaccination clinics also exist throughout Israel, allowing healthcare professionals to vaccinate larger groups of people quickly. On January 19, 2021, the country announced a new daily record of more than 210,000 vaccinations in 1 day.

Israel began vaccinating healthcare workers, teachers, people with medical conditions, and those over the age of 60 years. Now, the country is racing to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 years — equating to about 5.2 million people — by the end of March. As of January 20, Israel has started vaccinating residents over the age of 40 years.

At the time of writing, Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to more than 76% of the country’s inhabitants who work as teachers, are over the age of 60 years, or have health risks.


ADVERTISING

CORONAVIRUS NEWS
Stay informed about COVID-19
Get the latest updates and research-backed information on the novel coronavirus direct to your inbox.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Controversies
Despite these achievements, some people in Israel are regularly demonstrating against the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Hailed as a way to restore normalcy — and save the economy — the government calls the COVID-19 vaccine rollout “Operation Back to Life.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that it will allow Israel to become the first country in the world to emerge from the pandemic.

However, it is less clear precisely how and when Israel will be able to revert to so-called normal life.

On January 19, the country reported a record high of more than 10,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day and a positivity rate above 10% for the first time in 3 months. Also, 30–40% of new cases are linked to the new COVID-19 variant that scientists first recognized in the U.K.

Israeli, currently in its third lockdown, also faces high levels of unemployment and a recession, but the authorities have extended the current nationwide lockdown until at least January 31.

Netanyahu’s political opponents also accuse the government of using the vaccine campaign for political gain before the upcoming election.

The country is on track to vaccinate everyone over the age of 16 years just 3 days before the election on March 23. In addition, the government is discussing postponing the election if infection rates stay high.

The government is also receiving criticism for not sharing enough details about what patient data it will share or how Pfizer will use the information.

Government officials only recently disclosed some terms of the deal, claiming that it will only share general data with Pfizer, such as data about the numbers of cases, serious cases, fatalities, and vaccinations, and each individual’s age and gender.

They also say that the data will help researchers assess and track herd immunity, with the results to feature in a recognized medical journal.

But Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, expressed her worries that anonymized patient data, including complete medical histories, will be shared.

Although they will not bear patient names or identifying markers, she said that it is possible to de-anonymize the files. Treating these personal data as though they belong to the government in this way is “not ethically, not legally, and not morally

,” she added.


MEDICAL NEWS TODAY NEWSLETTER
Knowledge is power. Get our free daily newsletter.
Dig deeper into the health topics you care about most. Subscribe to our facts-first newsletter today.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Health equity issues
According to human rights groups, Palestinians living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip do not have access to the vaccine and will not for a long time. Under the 4th Geneva Convention, occupying forces must provide healthcare to the populations of the territories they occupy.

Yet Palestinian officials seem reluctant to make a formal request to Israel to provide the vaccine, likely because asking for help from Israel is politically sensitive.

Also, the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s, which were meant to be a temporary road map to develop a Palestinian state, gave Palestinians responsibility for their healthcare.

Israel’s health minister reportedly told Sky News that the Palestinians simply need to “learn how to take care of themselves.”

He said that Israel has provided advice, supplies, and medicine to its neighbors, adding that it is in Israel’s best interest to reduce Palestinian case numbers, as many Palestinians work in Israel.

But some international organizations condemn Israel’s failure to provide the vaccine equitably.

According to Saleh Higazi, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director:

“Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program highlights the institutionalized discrimination that defines the Israeli government’s policy toward Palestinians. There could hardly be a better illustration of how Israeli lives are valued above Palestinian ones.”

The Palestinian government has arranged for vaccine shipments from four companies that should arrive this quarter. The state may also start receiving doses in February from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine schemeTrusted Source for low-to-middle-income countries.

Another issue complicating the vaccine rollout is the reluctance and fear among the country’s Arab and Orthodox populations regarding the vaccine and pandemic restrictions.

Vaccination rates are low among the Arab community in Israel.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are registering record high numbers of new cases of COVID-19. There are also reports of lax preventive restrictions in these communities, with some schools remaining open and multiple reports of large gatherings.

On January 20, the government announced the launch of a campaign to educate the Ultra-Orthodox community about pandemic risks and the importance of following the rules.​

All the billions given to the "Palis" and they can't get vaccines?

Billions?

I presume you can count what we and the UN have given the "Palis" since the 50s.

USA TODAY

www.usatoday.com

How much aid does the U.S. give Israel?
The United States has given Israel a total of $146 billion in bilateral assistance and missile defense funding through 2020, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), which provides nonpartisan research to lawmakers. That makes it the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign aid since World War II. (Other top recipients include Egypt and Afghanistan.

Israel has spent every penny building a state of the art nation that doesn’t need to beg for resources from other nations.

For your education:

U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL33222.pdf

 

[rylah]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

Jewish fascists

Space laser fascists!

Thanks for proving you have no actual argument,
indeed the headline said it would be too smart for you.

Consider first the case of an Israeli named Ami Popper. In May 1990, two years after the original publication of this book, Popper put on his army uniform and asked men waiting at a bus stop in a southern Israeli town for their identity cards. After confirming they were Arabs he lined them up and opened fire, killing seven. Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir immediately declared that the killings had no political significance, but were instead the act of a "deranged individual." Popper, however, was found sane and fit to stand trial. He is now serving a long prison sentence for murder and recently married the adopted daughter of Rabbi Meir Kahane's son, Benjamin Kahane, leader of the Kahane Chai (Kahane Lives) movement. Popper's sentence is the subject of regular appeals by settlers and other Jewish fundamentalists who demand his release as a "political prisoner."

Approximately six years later, on February 28, 1994, Dr. Baruch Goldstein woke up early in Kiryat Arba, an Israeli settlement on the West Bank near the ancient Jewish town and contemporary Palestinian Arab city of Hebron. Goldstein was an American Jewish immigrant to Israel also affiliated to Meir Kahane's organization. The previous day he had meticulously updated his patients' files and composed a farewell note to his coworkers thanking them for the opportunity to work with them toward the fulfillment of the "complete redemption." He donned his army uniform, picked up his assault rifle and several clips of ammunition, and went to the Tomb of the Patriarchs in the center of Hebron, where Abraham (Ibrahim to Muslims) is believed buried.

With a marksman's headset protecting his ears Goldstein brushed aside the unarmed Arab guard and entered the portion of the site reserved as a mosque. The room was packed with Muslims reciting their prayers for the holy month of Ramadan. Goldstein pointed his gun and began killing the kneeling men and boys. When his gun jammed he was beaten to death by desperate survivors, but not before he had shot twenty-nine people to death, wounded dozens more, and unleashed a torrent of violence that seriously jeopardized the budding peace process.

For The Land and The Lord: Preface

www.sas.upenn.edu

"We feel that [Baruch] Goldstein took a preventative measure against yet another Arab attack on Jews. We understand his motivation, his grief and his actions. And we are not ashamed to say that Goldstein was a charter member of the Jewish Defense League

You are being redirected...

www.adl.org

Great!

Let's see if instead of random copy-paste,
you can actually string any original thought,
and try explain - what were they wrong about?

 

[Indeependent]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

NEWSLETTER

COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Israel: Successes, lessons, and caveats
Israel is a world leader in the race to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine. In this Special Feature, Medical News Today look at why the vaccine rollout has been so successful in Israel and discuss the controversies and equity issues related to the campaign.

EMMANUEL DUNAND/Getty Images
All data and statistics are based on publicly available data at the time of publication. Some information may be out of date. Visit our coronavirus hub and follow our live updates page for the most recent information on the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the United States has struggled to meet COVID-19 vaccine rollout goals, within just 2 weeks, Israel vaccinated almost 15% of the country’s population of more than 9 million.

As of January 19, 2021, 25.6% of the Israeli population have received their first vaccine dose, and 550,000 people have received both doses.

To give some perspective, Israel is vaccinating residents at a rate of 32.4 people per 100, compared with 4.8 people per 100 in the U.S., and 7 per 100 in the United Kingdom.

But why exactly has the rollout been so successful in Israel? And what can we learn from this early success? In this Special Feature, we review what is known about Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Early rollout successes
Israel’s success in rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine seems to be due to several factors influencing the access to and distribution of the vaccine.

The Israeli government started searching early on for a way to secure vaccine doses.

In June 2020, Israel became one of the first countries to sign a purchase agreement for a vaccine supply from Moderna. In November, the country announced additional vaccine deals with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

The first Pfizer vaccine doses arrived in Israel on December 9, 2020, and vaccinations began on December 19, 2020. The country is still waiting for the other two vaccines.

Israel’s government also allegedly agreed to pay top dollar for vaccines and purchase millions of doses. Although the exact price is unknown, one official said that the price was about $30 per vaccine — double the average price abroad.

The makers of the vaccine that Israel is currently using — U.S. company Pfizer and German partner BioNTech — would not comment on the cost of the vaccine.

In exchange for an early, steady vaccine supply, the Israeli government also assured Pfizer that the country’s rollout would offer quick, large-scale results, promising to give the company detailed patient information on those receiving the vaccine in Israel.

Israeli officials expected Israel’s vaccine rollout to be successful because the country is small but has a vast healthcare infrastructure. The country also has a well-developed, universal healthcare system that connects all residents to a national digital health network.

All residents also have insurance from semi-private healthcare maintenance organizations (HMOs) that run services throughout the country, even in rural, remote regions.

Israel’s centralized, digitized system makes it easier to track and access information and roll out national healthcare agendas, such as vaccination campaigns.

“In a sense, Israel has become like a very large clinical trial,” Hadassah Medical Center virologist Dr. Rivka Abulafia-Lapid told The Times of Israel.

“Because everyone in Israel belongs to an HMO, and their records are kept along with their background data, this means we’ll get a good picture of responsiveness to the vaccine, in context of age, gender, and existing medical conditions,” Dr. Abulafia-Lapid added.


Distribution successes
Israel’s vaccine rollout success is also due in part to the handling of the vaccine and its delivery to citizens.

Those responsible for logistics have stored the vaccine doses underground near Israel’s main airport. They are in 30 large freezers, which are capable of holding 5 million doses.

Teams in Israel have also developed a way to repack doses from large, ultra-frozen pallets into insulated boxes roughly the size of a pizza box. Doing this has made it easier to distribute vaccine doses in smaller numbers and to remote sites.

Teams repack large vaccine pallets into bundles containing as few as 100 doses, which they then deliver to 400 vaccination centers. Healthcare professionals have also managed to obtain more vaccine doses out of each vial than Pfizer had initially advertised.

Pfizer have approved both of these processes.

Some 335 drive-through vaccination clinics also exist throughout Israel, allowing healthcare professionals to vaccinate larger groups of people quickly. On January 19, 2021, the country announced a new daily record of more than 210,000 vaccinations in 1 day.

Israel began vaccinating healthcare workers, teachers, people with medical conditions, and those over the age of 60 years. Now, the country is racing to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 years — equating to about 5.2 million people — by the end of March. As of January 20, Israel has started vaccinating residents over the age of 40 years.

At the time of writing, Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to more than 76% of the country’s inhabitants who work as teachers, are over the age of 60 years, or have health risks.


ADVERTISING

CORONAVIRUS NEWS
Stay informed about COVID-19
Get the latest updates and research-backed information on the novel coronavirus direct to your inbox.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Controversies
Despite these achievements, some people in Israel are regularly demonstrating against the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Hailed as a way to restore normalcy — and save the economy — the government calls the COVID-19 vaccine rollout “Operation Back to Life.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that it will allow Israel to become the first country in the world to emerge from the pandemic.

However, it is less clear precisely how and when Israel will be able to revert to so-called normal life.

On January 19, the country reported a record high of more than 10,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day and a positivity rate above 10% for the first time in 3 months. Also, 30–40% of new cases are linked to the new COVID-19 variant that scientists first recognized in the U.K.

Israeli, currently in its third lockdown, also faces high levels of unemployment and a recession, but the authorities have extended the current nationwide lockdown until at least January 31.

Netanyahu’s political opponents also accuse the government of using the vaccine campaign for political gain before the upcoming election.

The country is on track to vaccinate everyone over the age of 16 years just 3 days before the election on March 23. In addition, the government is discussing postponing the election if infection rates stay high.

The government is also receiving criticism for not sharing enough details about what patient data it will share or how Pfizer will use the information.

Government officials only recently disclosed some terms of the deal, claiming that it will only share general data with Pfizer, such as data about the numbers of cases, serious cases, fatalities, and vaccinations, and each individual’s age and gender.

They also say that the data will help researchers assess and track herd immunity, with the results to feature in a recognized medical journal.

But Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, expressed her worries that anonymized patient data, including complete medical histories, will be shared.

Although they will not bear patient names or identifying markers, she said that it is possible to de-anonymize the files. Treating these personal data as though they belong to the government in this way is “not ethically, not legally, and not morally

,” she added.


MEDICAL NEWS TODAY NEWSLETTER
Knowledge is power. Get our free daily newsletter.
Dig deeper into the health topics you care about most. Subscribe to our facts-first newsletter today.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Health equity issues
According to human rights groups, Palestinians living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip do not have access to the vaccine and will not for a long time. Under the 4th Geneva Convention, occupying forces must provide healthcare to the populations of the territories they occupy.

Yet Palestinian officials seem reluctant to make a formal request to Israel to provide the vaccine, likely because asking for help from Israel is politically sensitive.

Also, the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s, which were meant to be a temporary road map to develop a Palestinian state, gave Palestinians responsibility for their healthcare.

Israel’s health minister reportedly told Sky News that the Palestinians simply need to “learn how to take care of themselves.”

He said that Israel has provided advice, supplies, and medicine to its neighbors, adding that it is in Israel’s best interest to reduce Palestinian case numbers, as many Palestinians work in Israel.

But some international organizations condemn Israel’s failure to provide the vaccine equitably.

According to Saleh Higazi, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director:

“Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program highlights the institutionalized discrimination that defines the Israeli government’s policy toward Palestinians. There could hardly be a better illustration of how Israeli lives are valued above Palestinian ones.”

The Palestinian government has arranged for vaccine shipments from four companies that should arrive this quarter. The state may also start receiving doses in February from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine schemeTrusted Source for low-to-middle-income countries.

Another issue complicating the vaccine rollout is the reluctance and fear among the country’s Arab and Orthodox populations regarding the vaccine and pandemic restrictions.

Vaccination rates are low among the Arab community in Israel.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are registering record high numbers of new cases of COVID-19. There are also reports of lax preventive restrictions in these communities, with some schools remaining open and multiple reports of large gatherings.

On January 20, the government announced the launch of a campaign to educate the Ultra-Orthodox community about pandemic risks and the importance of following the rules.​

All the billions given to the "Palis" and they can't get vaccines?

Billions?

I presume you can count what we and the UN have given the "Palis" since the 50s.

USA TODAY

www.usatoday.com

How much aid does the U.S. give Israel?
The United States has given Israel a total of $146 billion in bilateral assistance and missile defense funding through 2020, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), which provides nonpartisan research to lawmakers. That makes it the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign aid since World War II. (Other top recipients include Egypt and Afghanistan.

Israel has spent every penny building a state of the art nation that doesn’t need to beg for resources from other nations.

For your education:

U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL33222.pdf

I agree.
I say let Israel do the same work and sell it to the US for 10billion rather than take the 3.8B and give over the specifications.

 

[Indeependent]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

NEWSLETTER

COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Israel: Successes, lessons, and caveats
Israel is a world leader in the race to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine. In this Special Feature, Medical News Today look at why the vaccine rollout has been so successful in Israel and discuss the controversies and equity issues related to the campaign.

EMMANUEL DUNAND/Getty Images
All data and statistics are based on publicly available data at the time of publication. Some information may be out of date. Visit our coronavirus hub and follow our live updates page for the most recent information on the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the United States has struggled to meet COVID-19 vaccine rollout goals, within just 2 weeks, Israel vaccinated almost 15% of the country’s population of more than 9 million.

As of January 19, 2021, 25.6% of the Israeli population have received their first vaccine dose, and 550,000 people have received both doses.

To give some perspective, Israel is vaccinating residents at a rate of 32.4 people per 100, compared with 4.8 people per 100 in the U.S., and 7 per 100 in the United Kingdom.

But why exactly has the rollout been so successful in Israel? And what can we learn from this early success? In this Special Feature, we review what is known about Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Early rollout successes
Israel’s success in rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine seems to be due to several factors influencing the access to and distribution of the vaccine.

The Israeli government started searching early on for a way to secure vaccine doses.

In June 2020, Israel became one of the first countries to sign a purchase agreement for a vaccine supply from Moderna. In November, the country announced additional vaccine deals with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

The first Pfizer vaccine doses arrived in Israel on December 9, 2020, and vaccinations began on December 19, 2020. The country is still waiting for the other two vaccines.

Israel’s government also allegedly agreed to pay top dollar for vaccines and purchase millions of doses. Although the exact price is unknown, one official said that the price was about $30 per vaccine — double the average price abroad.

The makers of the vaccine that Israel is currently using — U.S. company Pfizer and German partner BioNTech — would not comment on the cost of the vaccine.

In exchange for an early, steady vaccine supply, the Israeli government also assured Pfizer that the country’s rollout would offer quick, large-scale results, promising to give the company detailed patient information on those receiving the vaccine in Israel.

Israeli officials expected Israel’s vaccine rollout to be successful because the country is small but has a vast healthcare infrastructure. The country also has a well-developed, universal healthcare system that connects all residents to a national digital health network.

All residents also have insurance from semi-private healthcare maintenance organizations (HMOs) that run services throughout the country, even in rural, remote regions.

Israel’s centralized, digitized system makes it easier to track and access information and roll out national healthcare agendas, such as vaccination campaigns.

“In a sense, Israel has become like a very large clinical trial,” Hadassah Medical Center virologist Dr. Rivka Abulafia-Lapid told The Times of Israel.

“Because everyone in Israel belongs to an HMO, and their records are kept along with their background data, this means we’ll get a good picture of responsiveness to the vaccine, in context of age, gender, and existing medical conditions,” Dr. Abulafia-Lapid added.


Distribution successes
Israel’s vaccine rollout success is also due in part to the handling of the vaccine and its delivery to citizens.

Those responsible for logistics have stored the vaccine doses underground near Israel’s main airport. They are in 30 large freezers, which are capable of holding 5 million doses.

Teams in Israel have also developed a way to repack doses from large, ultra-frozen pallets into insulated boxes roughly the size of a pizza box. Doing this has made it easier to distribute vaccine doses in smaller numbers and to remote sites.

Teams repack large vaccine pallets into bundles containing as few as 100 doses, which they then deliver to 400 vaccination centers. Healthcare professionals have also managed to obtain more vaccine doses out of each vial than Pfizer had initially advertised.

Pfizer have approved both of these processes.

Some 335 drive-through vaccination clinics also exist throughout Israel, allowing healthcare professionals to vaccinate larger groups of people quickly. On January 19, 2021, the country announced a new daily record of more than 210,000 vaccinations in 1 day.

Israel began vaccinating healthcare workers, teachers, people with medical conditions, and those over the age of 60 years. Now, the country is racing to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 years — equating to about 5.2 million people — by the end of March. As of January 20, Israel has started vaccinating residents over the age of 40 years.

At the time of writing, Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to more than 76% of the country’s inhabitants who work as teachers, are over the age of 60 years, or have health risks.


ADVERTISING

CORONAVIRUS NEWS
Stay informed about COVID-19
Get the latest updates and research-backed information on the novel coronavirus direct to your inbox.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Controversies
Despite these achievements, some people in Israel are regularly demonstrating against the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Hailed as a way to restore normalcy — and save the economy — the government calls the COVID-19 vaccine rollout “Operation Back to Life.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that it will allow Israel to become the first country in the world to emerge from the pandemic.

However, it is less clear precisely how and when Israel will be able to revert to so-called normal life.

On January 19, the country reported a record high of more than 10,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day and a positivity rate above 10% for the first time in 3 months. Also, 30–40% of new cases are linked to the new COVID-19 variant that scientists first recognized in the U.K.

Israeli, currently in its third lockdown, also faces high levels of unemployment and a recession, but the authorities have extended the current nationwide lockdown until at least January 31.

Netanyahu’s political opponents also accuse the government of using the vaccine campaign for political gain before the upcoming election.

The country is on track to vaccinate everyone over the age of 16 years just 3 days before the election on March 23. In addition, the government is discussing postponing the election if infection rates stay high.

The government is also receiving criticism for not sharing enough details about what patient data it will share or how Pfizer will use the information.

Government officials only recently disclosed some terms of the deal, claiming that it will only share general data with Pfizer, such as data about the numbers of cases, serious cases, fatalities, and vaccinations, and each individual’s age and gender.

They also say that the data will help researchers assess and track herd immunity, with the results to feature in a recognized medical journal.

But Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, expressed her worries that anonymized patient data, including complete medical histories, will be shared.

Although they will not bear patient names or identifying markers, she said that it is possible to de-anonymize the files. Treating these personal data as though they belong to the government in this way is “not ethically, not legally, and not morally

,” she added.


MEDICAL NEWS TODAY NEWSLETTER
Knowledge is power. Get our free daily newsletter.
Dig deeper into the health topics you care about most. Subscribe to our facts-first newsletter today.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Health equity issues
According to human rights groups, Palestinians living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip do not have access to the vaccine and will not for a long time. Under the 4th Geneva Convention, occupying forces must provide healthcare to the populations of the territories they occupy.

Yet Palestinian officials seem reluctant to make a formal request to Israel to provide the vaccine, likely because asking for help from Israel is politically sensitive.

Also, the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s, which were meant to be a temporary road map to develop a Palestinian state, gave Palestinians responsibility for their healthcare.

Israel’s health minister reportedly told Sky News that the Palestinians simply need to “learn how to take care of themselves.”

He said that Israel has provided advice, supplies, and medicine to its neighbors, adding that it is in Israel’s best interest to reduce Palestinian case numbers, as many Palestinians work in Israel.

But some international organizations condemn Israel’s failure to provide the vaccine equitably.

According to Saleh Higazi, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director:

“Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program highlights the institutionalized discrimination that defines the Israeli government’s policy toward Palestinians. There could hardly be a better illustration of how Israeli lives are valued above Palestinian ones.”

The Palestinian government has arranged for vaccine shipments from four companies that should arrive this quarter. The state may also start receiving doses in February from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine schemeTrusted Source for low-to-middle-income countries.

Another issue complicating the vaccine rollout is the reluctance and fear among the country’s Arab and Orthodox populations regarding the vaccine and pandemic restrictions.

Vaccination rates are low among the Arab community in Israel.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are registering record high numbers of new cases of COVID-19. There are also reports of lax preventive restrictions in these communities, with some schools remaining open and multiple reports of large gatherings.

On January 20, the government announced the launch of a campaign to educate the Ultra-Orthodox community about pandemic risks and the importance of following the rules.​

All the billions given to the "Palis" and they can't get vaccines?

Billions?

I presume you can count what we and the UN have given the "Palis" since the 50s.

USA TODAY

www.usatoday.com

How much aid does the U.S. give Israel?
The United States has given Israel a total of $146 billion in bilateral assistance and missile defense funding through 2020, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), which provides nonpartisan research to lawmakers. That makes it the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign aid since World War II. (Other top recipients include Egypt and Afghanistan.

Israel has spent every penny building a state of the art nation that doesn’t need to beg for resources from other nations.

It's called welfare

See post 89.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

Today's antisemitic Jews of IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace have an illustrious antecedent.

From JTA, August 13, 1933:

Although the fortunes of many have been wiped out, although their professions have been taken away from them, and although they live in a state of rigid suspense and fear of the moment when they will be humiliated, beaten, or imprisoned, a large number of German Jews continue to remain faithful to the fatherland.

A few of them even support the current anti-Semitic National Socialist administration because of the party’s policies on non-racial questions. They applaud the party’s success in uniting the various divergent parts of Germany. They strongly approve Germany’s demands for restoration of the old empire and the rearmament of the country. And in certain of its aspects they even support the current action of the Nazis against their race.

Dr. Max Naumann, leader of the Union of National German Jews, (Verband Nationaldeutscher Juden) an organization enrolling seven thousand Jewish citizens of Germany, declared in an interview that Nazi action against Jews was in many ways justified. He further stated that patriotic German Jews did not want the support of foreign [column cut off]

Dr. Naumann scored the Zionists for their retention of Jewish customs and their unquenchable desire to create a Jewish nation. He declared they were intrinsically traitors to the country in which they lived. On this basis he supported Nazi action against the famous scientist, Albert Einstein, because he is a Zionist.

Eastern Jews, according to Dr. Naumann, came to Germany in great numbers immediately after the World War. During the inflation period and financial crisis of 1920-23 almost 600,000 Eastern Jews took advantage of the situation, bought for a few foreign pennies valuable estates, reconverted or mortgaged them after stabilization, and left the country. He estimates the number of Eastern Jews in Germany now at 50,000.

Dr. Naumann believes the German government would be quite within its right in confiscating the properties of Eastern Jews who are now living abroad.

Anti-Zionist? Check.
Dividing Jews into "good assimilationist Jews" and "bad proud Jews"? Check.
Politics above logic and self-preservation? Check.

Sound familiar?

Even in 1935, as members of his group realized that Hitler is not someone to rely on, Naumann held his course - and accused his detractors of being "Zionists."

(full article online)

IfNotNow, Jewish Voice for Peace, and their spiritual ancestor the Verband Nationaldeutscher Juden

Blogging about Israel and the Arab world since, oh, forever.

elderofziyon.blogspot.com

Sulzberger and Schicklgruber

The Jewish Voice for Peace sounds a lot like the self-hating Jews at the New York Times.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

This thread will deal with news not only happening in Israel but around the world.

I will post the links to the news and it is up to those who wish to read and discuss them, to do so.

Attacks only, will be ignored. Multiple attackers will be put on ignore.

Discuss what the article says, and provide evidence to your arguments.

Keep the conversation on a civil level.

Thank you.

Benny Morris’s Untenable Denial of the Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine

Israeli historian Benny Morris denies the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, but his own research shows that this was indeed how Israel came into being.

www.foreignpolicyjournal.com

The Rabid Arab Rabble

So what? Some genos need to be cided. The Paleonasties are are an unfit species of useless thrill-killing bandits.

Cowardice Is the Crime That Enables All Others

You don't have the guts to fight back against subhuman, unevolved Arabs in the only way that will end their terror forever.

This thread will deal with news not only happening in Israel but around the world.

I will post the links to the news and it is up to those who wish to read and discuss them, to do so.

Attacks only, will be ignored. Multiple attackers will be put on ignore.

Discuss what the article says, and provide evidence to your arguments.

Keep the conversation on a civil level.

Thank you.

"The Rabid Arab Rabble

So what? Some genos need to be cided. The Paleonasties are are an unfit species of useless and vicious bandits"

Hamas is following the example of Jewish terrorists

Israel Is Our Shield

Using the moral-equivalency lie to cover up your cowardice and treason.

"You don't have the guts to fight back against subhuman, unevolved Arabs in the only way that will end their terror forever."
Bigotry

All Masochists Are Also Sadists and Love Them Some Jew-Killing

I'd rather be a Big Ot than a little snot. Grow up, instead of taking an ignorant and childish view of the world as it is.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

NEWSLETTER

COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Israel: Successes, lessons, and caveats
Israel is a world leader in the race to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine. In this Special Feature, Medical News Today look at why the vaccine rollout has been so successful in Israel and discuss the controversies and equity issues related to the campaign.

EMMANUEL DUNAND/Getty Images
All data and statistics are based on publicly available data at the time of publication. Some information may be out of date. Visit our coronavirus hub and follow our live updates page for the most recent information on the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the United States has struggled to meet COVID-19 vaccine rollout goals, within just 2 weeks, Israel vaccinated almost 15% of the country’s population of more than 9 million.

As of January 19, 2021, 25.6% of the Israeli population have received their first vaccine dose, and 550,000 people have received both doses.

To give some perspective, Israel is vaccinating residents at a rate of 32.4 people per 100, compared with 4.8 people per 100 in the U.S., and 7 per 100 in the United Kingdom.

But why exactly has the rollout been so successful in Israel? And what can we learn from this early success? In this Special Feature, we review what is known about Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Early rollout successes
Israel’s success in rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine seems to be due to several factors influencing the access to and distribution of the vaccine.

The Israeli government started searching early on for a way to secure vaccine doses.

In June 2020, Israel became one of the first countries to sign a purchase agreement for a vaccine supply from Moderna. In November, the country announced additional vaccine deals with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

The first Pfizer vaccine doses arrived in Israel on December 9, 2020, and vaccinations began on December 19, 2020. The country is still waiting for the other two vaccines.

Israel’s government also allegedly agreed to pay top dollar for vaccines and purchase millions of doses. Although the exact price is unknown, one official said that the price was about $30 per vaccine — double the average price abroad.

The makers of the vaccine that Israel is currently using — U.S. company Pfizer and German partner BioNTech — would not comment on the cost of the vaccine.

In exchange for an early, steady vaccine supply, the Israeli government also assured Pfizer that the country’s rollout would offer quick, large-scale results, promising to give the company detailed patient information on those receiving the vaccine in Israel.

Israeli officials expected Israel’s vaccine rollout to be successful because the country is small but has a vast healthcare infrastructure. The country also has a well-developed, universal healthcare system that connects all residents to a national digital health network.

All residents also have insurance from semi-private healthcare maintenance organizations (HMOs) that run services throughout the country, even in rural, remote regions.

Israel’s centralized, digitized system makes it easier to track and access information and roll out national healthcare agendas, such as vaccination campaigns.

“In a sense, Israel has become like a very large clinical trial,” Hadassah Medical Center virologist Dr. Rivka Abulafia-Lapid told The Times of Israel.

“Because everyone in Israel belongs to an HMO, and their records are kept along with their background data, this means we’ll get a good picture of responsiveness to the vaccine, in context of age, gender, and existing medical conditions,” Dr. Abulafia-Lapid added.


Distribution successes
Israel’s vaccine rollout success is also due in part to the handling of the vaccine and its delivery to citizens.

Those responsible for logistics have stored the vaccine doses underground near Israel’s main airport. They are in 30 large freezers, which are capable of holding 5 million doses.

Teams in Israel have also developed a way to repack doses from large, ultra-frozen pallets into insulated boxes roughly the size of a pizza box. Doing this has made it easier to distribute vaccine doses in smaller numbers and to remote sites.

Teams repack large vaccine pallets into bundles containing as few as 100 doses, which they then deliver to 400 vaccination centers. Healthcare professionals have also managed to obtain more vaccine doses out of each vial than Pfizer had initially advertised.

Pfizer have approved both of these processes.

Some 335 drive-through vaccination clinics also exist throughout Israel, allowing healthcare professionals to vaccinate larger groups of people quickly. On January 19, 2021, the country announced a new daily record of more than 210,000 vaccinations in 1 day.

Israel began vaccinating healthcare workers, teachers, people with medical conditions, and those over the age of 60 years. Now, the country is racing to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 years — equating to about 5.2 million people — by the end of March. As of January 20, Israel has started vaccinating residents over the age of 40 years.

At the time of writing, Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to more than 76% of the country’s inhabitants who work as teachers, are over the age of 60 years, or have health risks.


ADVERTISING

CORONAVIRUS NEWS
Stay informed about COVID-19
Get the latest updates and research-backed information on the novel coronavirus direct to your inbox.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Controversies
Despite these achievements, some people in Israel are regularly demonstrating against the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Hailed as a way to restore normalcy — and save the economy — the government calls the COVID-19 vaccine rollout “Operation Back to Life.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that it will allow Israel to become the first country in the world to emerge from the pandemic.

However, it is less clear precisely how and when Israel will be able to revert to so-called normal life.

On January 19, the country reported a record high of more than 10,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day and a positivity rate above 10% for the first time in 3 months. Also, 30–40% of new cases are linked to the new COVID-19 variant that scientists first recognized in the U.K.

Israeli, currently in its third lockdown, also faces high levels of unemployment and a recession, but the authorities have extended the current nationwide lockdown until at least January 31.

Netanyahu’s political opponents also accuse the government of using the vaccine campaign for political gain before the upcoming election.

The country is on track to vaccinate everyone over the age of 16 years just 3 days before the election on March 23. In addition, the government is discussing postponing the election if infection rates stay high.

The government is also receiving criticism for not sharing enough details about what patient data it will share or how Pfizer will use the information.

Government officials only recently disclosed some terms of the deal, claiming that it will only share general data with Pfizer, such as data about the numbers of cases, serious cases, fatalities, and vaccinations, and each individual’s age and gender.

They also say that the data will help researchers assess and track herd immunity, with the results to feature in a recognized medical journal.

But Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, expressed her worries that anonymized patient data, including complete medical histories, will be shared.

Although they will not bear patient names or identifying markers, she said that it is possible to de-anonymize the files. Treating these personal data as though they belong to the government in this way is “not ethically, not legally, and not morally

,” she added.


MEDICAL NEWS TODAY NEWSLETTER
Knowledge is power. Get our free daily newsletter.
Dig deeper into the health topics you care about most. Subscribe to our facts-first newsletter today.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Health equity issues
According to human rights groups, Palestinians living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip do not have access to the vaccine and will not for a long time. Under the 4th Geneva Convention, occupying forces must provide healthcare to the populations of the territories they occupy.

Yet Palestinian officials seem reluctant to make a formal request to Israel to provide the vaccine, likely because asking for help from Israel is politically sensitive.

Also, the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s, which were meant to be a temporary road map to develop a Palestinian state, gave Palestinians responsibility for their healthcare.

Israel’s health minister reportedly told Sky News that the Palestinians simply need to “learn how to take care of themselves.”

He said that Israel has provided advice, supplies, and medicine to its neighbors, adding that it is in Israel’s best interest to reduce Palestinian case numbers, as many Palestinians work in Israel.

But some international organizations condemn Israel’s failure to provide the vaccine equitably.

According to Saleh Higazi, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director:

“Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program highlights the institutionalized discrimination that defines the Israeli government’s policy toward Palestinians. There could hardly be a better illustration of how Israeli lives are valued above Palestinian ones.”

The Palestinian government has arranged for vaccine shipments from four companies that should arrive this quarter. The state may also start receiving doses in February from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine schemeTrusted Source for low-to-middle-income countries.

Another issue complicating the vaccine rollout is the reluctance and fear among the country’s Arab and Orthodox populations regarding the vaccine and pandemic restrictions.

Vaccination rates are low among the Arab community in Israel.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are registering record high numbers of new cases of COVID-19. There are also reports of lax preventive restrictions in these communities, with some schools remaining open and multiple reports of large gatherings.

On January 20, the government announced the launch of a campaign to educate the Ultra-Orthodox community about pandemic risks and the importance of following the rules.​

All the billions given to the "Palis" and they can't get vaccines?

Serum for Serial Killers

The Whirled Health Organization (Who?) should find out a way to turn vaccines into suicide bombs and the Paleonasties will buy all they can get.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

I find this rather interesting:

Arabs and Jews in Israel unite against Netanyahu and occupation

After an 11-day war that killed more than 240 Palestinians and 12 Israelis, a fragile ceasefire between the right-wing government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Islamist Hamas militants that rule Gaza took hold early Friday morning.

www.peoplesworld.org

Without Likud, the Jews Are Licked

The predatory Islamic beasts will see that as a sign of weakness and a signal to attack.

 

[Sixties Fan]

People like to say there will be no peace until "occupation" ends. This is of course nonsense, since there wasn't peace before "occupation."

I noted yesterday a 1929 conference where Arab leaders said there would be no peace until the Balfour Declaration was rescinded.

Yet even that wouldn't go back enough in history to make the Palestinian Arabs happy.

In his opening speech to the "Refuting Israel's Narrative" conference I've been reporting on this week, Palestinian prime minister Mohamed Shtayyeh said something notable.

Shtayyeh said, "The colonization of Palestine did not begin with the Zionist movement, but 15 years before its establishment, as the first colony to be established was Petah Tikva, in 1882."

The land for Petah Tikva was purchased by religious Jews from two Jaffa landowners in 1878. The Ottomans allowed the purchase because the land was considered to be low quality. After initial setbacks and a malaria outbreak, the Jews drained the swamps and managed to build up the land, first as a farm and then as a city.

Even in its earliest days, Petah Tikva was attacked by Arabs. It didn't matter that the land was purchased legally or that it was uninhabitable before the Jews came.

The supposedly moderate Palestinian prime minister reminds us that the Palestinian problem isn't with "occupation" or "colonialism" or "ethnic cleansing" or the other lies they tell the West. Even blaming the Balfour Declaration is false.

Their problem is with Jews.

(full article online)

Palestinian PM says the original sin is Jews in Petah Tikva, 1882

Blogging about Israel and the Arab world since, oh, forever.

elderofziyon.blogspot.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

But over in Gaza, Hamas' reaction to the bombing is completely different.

Instead of magnifying it into a crime against humanity, Hamas shrugged it off as a mere symbolic gesture.

Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum described the occupation's bombing of a resistance site at dawn as just for show.

Barhoum said in a statement: "The bombing of one of the resistance sites in Gaza by the Israeli occupation is nothing but a showy reaction to placate its settlers and cover up its escalating crises."

Unlike Werleman, Hamas admits that the target was a Hamas site. Unlike Werleman, Hamas says that the bombing is not a big deal at all.

Major war crime or meaningless fireworks? It all depends on what kind of propaganda you want to spread.

(full article online)

The messages are completely different depending on the audience

Blogging about Israel and the Arab world since, oh, forever.

elderofziyon.blogspot.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

There is enormous pressure, also in the European Parliament, to label products because a lot of my colleagues consider the settlements illegal. They think the rule should be that products coming from regions with an illegal status couldn’t have normal access to the European market."

Advocate for Israel​

My Lord, the court will hear evidence that the real estate given the name, ‘Occupied Palestinian Territory’ (OPT) is not real. There are two hard reasons for that:

(1) War records turn up nothing to support the name.

(2) Law and statutes turn up nothing to support it.

Evidence will be led that OPT reflects a political policy or aspiration. There really is no Palestinian territory to be occupied.

Evidence will be led that the move to debar Israeli products made in the ‘OPT’ has everything to do with lobby groups and politics but nothing to do with informing and protecting the customer. To the contrary, the label would trick unwary customers. It would also cast suspicion on any product labelled thus, and be used as a backdoor trade boycott of Israel.




(full article online)

The Case against 'Occupied Palestinian Territory'

www.israelnationalnews.com

 

[Stuartbirdan2]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

NEWSLETTER

COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Israel: Successes, lessons, and caveats
Israel is a world leader in the race to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine. In this Special Feature, Medical News Today look at why the vaccine rollout has been so successful in Israel and discuss the controversies and equity issues related to the campaign.

EMMANUEL DUNAND/Getty Images
All data and statistics are based on publicly available data at the time of publication. Some information may be out of date. Visit our coronavirus hub and follow our live updates page for the most recent information on the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the United States has struggled to meet COVID-19 vaccine rollout goals, within just 2 weeks, Israel vaccinated almost 15% of the country’s population of more than 9 million.

As of January 19, 2021, 25.6% of the Israeli population have received their first vaccine dose, and 550,000 people have received both doses.

To give some perspective, Israel is vaccinating residents at a rate of 32.4 people per 100, compared with 4.8 people per 100 in the U.S., and 7 per 100 in the United Kingdom.

But why exactly has the rollout been so successful in Israel? And what can we learn from this early success? In this Special Feature, we review what is known about Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Early rollout successes
Israel’s success in rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine seems to be due to several factors influencing the access to and distribution of the vaccine.

The Israeli government started searching early on for a way to secure vaccine doses.

In June 2020, Israel became one of the first countries to sign a purchase agreement for a vaccine supply from Moderna. In November, the country announced additional vaccine deals with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

The first Pfizer vaccine doses arrived in Israel on December 9, 2020, and vaccinations began on December 19, 2020. The country is still waiting for the other two vaccines.

Israel’s government also allegedly agreed to pay top dollar for vaccines and purchase millions of doses. Although the exact price is unknown, one official said that the price was about $30 per vaccine — double the average price abroad.

The makers of the vaccine that Israel is currently using — U.S. company Pfizer and German partner BioNTech — would not comment on the cost of the vaccine.

In exchange for an early, steady vaccine supply, the Israeli government also assured Pfizer that the country’s rollout would offer quick, large-scale results, promising to give the company detailed patient information on those receiving the vaccine in Israel.

Israeli officials expected Israel’s vaccine rollout to be successful because the country is small but has a vast healthcare infrastructure. The country also has a well-developed, universal healthcare system that connects all residents to a national digital health network.

All residents also have insurance from semi-private healthcare maintenance organizations (HMOs) that run services throughout the country, even in rural, remote regions.

Israel’s centralized, digitized system makes it easier to track and access information and roll out national healthcare agendas, such as vaccination campaigns.

“In a sense, Israel has become like a very large clinical trial,” Hadassah Medical Center virologist Dr. Rivka Abulafia-Lapid told The Times of Israel.

“Because everyone in Israel belongs to an HMO, and their records are kept along with their background data, this means we’ll get a good picture of responsiveness to the vaccine, in context of age, gender, and existing medical conditions,” Dr. Abulafia-Lapid added.


Distribution successes
Israel’s vaccine rollout success is also due in part to the handling of the vaccine and its delivery to citizens.

Those responsible for logistics have stored the vaccine doses underground near Israel’s main airport. They are in 30 large freezers, which are capable of holding 5 million doses.

Teams in Israel have also developed a way to repack doses from large, ultra-frozen pallets into insulated boxes roughly the size of a pizza box. Doing this has made it easier to distribute vaccine doses in smaller numbers and to remote sites.

Teams repack large vaccine pallets into bundles containing as few as 100 doses, which they then deliver to 400 vaccination centers. Healthcare professionals have also managed to obtain more vaccine doses out of each vial than Pfizer had initially advertised.

Pfizer have approved both of these processes.

Some 335 drive-through vaccination clinics also exist throughout Israel, allowing healthcare professionals to vaccinate larger groups of people quickly. On January 19, 2021, the country announced a new daily record of more than 210,000 vaccinations in 1 day.

Israel began vaccinating healthcare workers, teachers, people with medical conditions, and those over the age of 60 years. Now, the country is racing to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 years — equating to about 5.2 million people — by the end of March. As of January 20, Israel has started vaccinating residents over the age of 40 years.

At the time of writing, Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to more than 76% of the country’s inhabitants who work as teachers, are over the age of 60 years, or have health risks.


ADVERTISING

CORONAVIRUS NEWS
Stay informed about COVID-19
Get the latest updates and research-backed information on the novel coronavirus direct to your inbox.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Controversies
Despite these achievements, some people in Israel are regularly demonstrating against the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Hailed as a way to restore normalcy — and save the economy — the government calls the COVID-19 vaccine rollout “Operation Back to Life.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that it will allow Israel to become the first country in the world to emerge from the pandemic.

However, it is less clear precisely how and when Israel will be able to revert to so-called normal life.

On January 19, the country reported a record high of more than 10,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day and a positivity rate above 10% for the first time in 3 months. Also, 30–40% of new cases are linked to the new COVID-19 variant that scientists first recognized in the U.K.

Israeli, currently in its third lockdown, also faces high levels of unemployment and a recession, but the authorities have extended the current nationwide lockdown until at least January 31.

Netanyahu’s political opponents also accuse the government of using the vaccine campaign for political gain before the upcoming election.

The country is on track to vaccinate everyone over the age of 16 years just 3 days before the election on March 23. In addition, the government is discussing postponing the election if infection rates stay high.

The government is also receiving criticism for not sharing enough details about what patient data it will share or how Pfizer will use the information.

Government officials only recently disclosed some terms of the deal, claiming that it will only share general data with Pfizer, such as data about the numbers of cases, serious cases, fatalities, and vaccinations, and each individual’s age and gender.

They also say that the data will help researchers assess and track herd immunity, with the results to feature in a recognized medical journal.

But Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, expressed her worries that anonymized patient data, including complete medical histories, will be shared.

Although they will not bear patient names or identifying markers, she said that it is possible to de-anonymize the files. Treating these personal data as though they belong to the government in this way is “not ethically, not legally, and not morally

,” she added.


MEDICAL NEWS TODAY NEWSLETTER
Knowledge is power. Get our free daily newsletter.
Dig deeper into the health topics you care about most. Subscribe to our facts-first newsletter today.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Health equity issues
According to human rights groups, Palestinians living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip do not have access to the vaccine and will not for a long time. Under the 4th Geneva Convention, occupying forces must provide healthcare to the populations of the territories they occupy.

Yet Palestinian officials seem reluctant to make a formal request to Israel to provide the vaccine, likely because asking for help from Israel is politically sensitive.

Also, the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s, which were meant to be a temporary road map to develop a Palestinian state, gave Palestinians responsibility for their healthcare.

Israel’s health minister reportedly told Sky News that the Palestinians simply need to “learn how to take care of themselves.”

He said that Israel has provided advice, supplies, and medicine to its neighbors, adding that it is in Israel’s best interest to reduce Palestinian case numbers, as many Palestinians work in Israel.

But some international organizations condemn Israel’s failure to provide the vaccine equitably.

According to Saleh Higazi, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director:

“Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program highlights the institutionalized discrimination that defines the Israeli government’s policy toward Palestinians. There could hardly be a better illustration of how Israeli lives are valued above Palestinian ones.”

The Palestinian government has arranged for vaccine shipments from four companies that should arrive this quarter. The state may also start receiving doses in February from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine schemeTrusted Source for low-to-middle-income countries.

Another issue complicating the vaccine rollout is the reluctance and fear among the country’s Arab and Orthodox populations regarding the vaccine and pandemic restrictions.

Vaccination rates are low among the Arab community in Israel.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are registering record high numbers of new cases of COVID-19. There are also reports of lax preventive restrictions in these communities, with some schools remaining open and multiple reports of large gatherings.

On January 20, the government announced the launch of a campaign to educate the Ultra-Orthodox community about pandemic risks and the importance of following the rules.​

All the billions given to the "Palis" and they can't get vaccines?

Billions?

I presume you can count what we and the UN have given the "Palis" since the 50s.

USA TODAY

www.usatoday.com

How much aid does the U.S. give Israel?
The United States has given Israel a total of $146 billion in bilateral assistance and missile defense funding through 2020, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), which provides nonpartisan research to lawmakers. That makes it the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign aid since World War II. (Other top recipients include Egypt and Afghanistan.

Israel has spent every penny building a state of the art nation that doesn’t need to beg for resources from other nations.

For your education:

U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL33222.pdf

Israel is the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign assistance since World War II.
Successive Administrations, working with Congress, have provided Israel with significant
assistance in light of robust domestic U.S. support for Israel and its security; shared strategic
goals in the Middle East; a mutual commitment to democratic values; and historicalties dating
from U.S. support for the creation of Israel in 1948. To date, the United States has provided Israel $146 billion (current, or
noninflation-adjusted, dollars) in bilateral assistance and missile defense funding. At present, almost all U.S. bilateral aid to
Israel is in the form of military assistance, although from 1971 to 2007, Israel also received significant economic assistance.

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL33222.pdf

 

[Sixties Fan]

It may be mentioned here that, thousands of Pakistani nationals have joined Palestinian terrorist groups such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad and fought against Israel. Every year, at least one thousand Pakistanis are traveling to Gaza and other parts of the West Bank and joining Hamas and Islamic Jihad.

(full article online)

Hamas looks for expanding globally

From the blog of Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury at The Times of Israel

blogs.timesofisrael.com

 

[Stuartbirdan2]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

NEWSLETTER

COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Israel: Successes, lessons, and caveats
Israel is a world leader in the race to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine. In this Special Feature, Medical News Today look at why the vaccine rollout has been so successful in Israel and discuss the controversies and equity issues related to the campaign.

EMMANUEL DUNAND/Getty Images
All data and statistics are based on publicly available data at the time of publication. Some information may be out of date. Visit our coronavirus hub and follow our live updates page for the most recent information on the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the United States has struggled to meet COVID-19 vaccine rollout goals, within just 2 weeks, Israel vaccinated almost 15% of the country’s population of more than 9 million.

As of January 19, 2021, 25.6% of the Israeli population have received their first vaccine dose, and 550,000 people have received both doses.

To give some perspective, Israel is vaccinating residents at a rate of 32.4 people per 100, compared with 4.8 people per 100 in the U.S., and 7 per 100 in the United Kingdom.

But why exactly has the rollout been so successful in Israel? And what can we learn from this early success? In this Special Feature, we review what is known about Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Early rollout successes
Israel’s success in rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine seems to be due to several factors influencing the access to and distribution of the vaccine.

The Israeli government started searching early on for a way to secure vaccine doses.

In June 2020, Israel became one of the first countries to sign a purchase agreement for a vaccine supply from Moderna. In November, the country announced additional vaccine deals with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

The first Pfizer vaccine doses arrived in Israel on December 9, 2020, and vaccinations began on December 19, 2020. The country is still waiting for the other two vaccines.

Israel’s government also allegedly agreed to pay top dollar for vaccines and purchase millions of doses. Although the exact price is unknown, one official said that the price was about $30 per vaccine — double the average price abroad.

The makers of the vaccine that Israel is currently using — U.S. company Pfizer and German partner BioNTech — would not comment on the cost of the vaccine.

In exchange for an early, steady vaccine supply, the Israeli government also assured Pfizer that the country’s rollout would offer quick, large-scale results, promising to give the company detailed patient information on those receiving the vaccine in Israel.

Israeli officials expected Israel’s vaccine rollout to be successful because the country is small but has a vast healthcare infrastructure. The country also has a well-developed, universal healthcare system that connects all residents to a national digital health network.

All residents also have insurance from semi-private healthcare maintenance organizations (HMOs) that run services throughout the country, even in rural, remote regions.

Israel’s centralized, digitized system makes it easier to track and access information and roll out national healthcare agendas, such as vaccination campaigns.

“In a sense, Israel has become like a very large clinical trial,” Hadassah Medical Center virologist Dr. Rivka Abulafia-Lapid told The Times of Israel.

“Because everyone in Israel belongs to an HMO, and their records are kept along with their background data, this means we’ll get a good picture of responsiveness to the vaccine, in context of age, gender, and existing medical conditions,” Dr. Abulafia-Lapid added.


Distribution successes
Israel’s vaccine rollout success is also due in part to the handling of the vaccine and its delivery to citizens.

Those responsible for logistics have stored the vaccine doses underground near Israel’s main airport. They are in 30 large freezers, which are capable of holding 5 million doses.

Teams in Israel have also developed a way to repack doses from large, ultra-frozen pallets into insulated boxes roughly the size of a pizza box. Doing this has made it easier to distribute vaccine doses in smaller numbers and to remote sites.

Teams repack large vaccine pallets into bundles containing as few as 100 doses, which they then deliver to 400 vaccination centers. Healthcare professionals have also managed to obtain more vaccine doses out of each vial than Pfizer had initially advertised.

Pfizer have approved both of these processes.

Some 335 drive-through vaccination clinics also exist throughout Israel, allowing healthcare professionals to vaccinate larger groups of people quickly. On January 19, 2021, the country announced a new daily record of more than 210,000 vaccinations in 1 day.

Israel began vaccinating healthcare workers, teachers, people with medical conditions, and those over the age of 60 years. Now, the country is racing to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 years — equating to about 5.2 million people — by the end of March. As of January 20, Israel has started vaccinating residents over the age of 40 years.

At the time of writing, Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to more than 76% of the country’s inhabitants who work as teachers, are over the age of 60 years, or have health risks.


ADVERTISING

CORONAVIRUS NEWS
Stay informed about COVID-19
Get the latest updates and research-backed information on the novel coronavirus direct to your inbox.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Controversies
Despite these achievements, some people in Israel are regularly demonstrating against the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Hailed as a way to restore normalcy — and save the economy — the government calls the COVID-19 vaccine rollout “Operation Back to Life.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that it will allow Israel to become the first country in the world to emerge from the pandemic.

However, it is less clear precisely how and when Israel will be able to revert to so-called normal life.

On January 19, the country reported a record high of more than 10,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day and a positivity rate above 10% for the first time in 3 months. Also, 30–40% of new cases are linked to the new COVID-19 variant that scientists first recognized in the U.K.

Israeli, currently in its third lockdown, also faces high levels of unemployment and a recession, but the authorities have extended the current nationwide lockdown until at least January 31.

Netanyahu’s political opponents also accuse the government of using the vaccine campaign for political gain before the upcoming election.

The country is on track to vaccinate everyone over the age of 16 years just 3 days before the election on March 23. In addition, the government is discussing postponing the election if infection rates stay high.

The government is also receiving criticism for not sharing enough details about what patient data it will share or how Pfizer will use the information.

Government officials only recently disclosed some terms of the deal, claiming that it will only share general data with Pfizer, such as data about the numbers of cases, serious cases, fatalities, and vaccinations, and each individual’s age and gender.

They also say that the data will help researchers assess and track herd immunity, with the results to feature in a recognized medical journal.

But Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, expressed her worries that anonymized patient data, including complete medical histories, will be shared.

Although they will not bear patient names or identifying markers, she said that it is possible to de-anonymize the files. Treating these personal data as though they belong to the government in this way is “not ethically, not legally, and not morally

,” she added.


MEDICAL NEWS TODAY NEWSLETTER
Knowledge is power. Get our free daily newsletter.
Dig deeper into the health topics you care about most. Subscribe to our facts-first newsletter today.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Health equity issues
According to human rights groups, Palestinians living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip do not have access to the vaccine and will not for a long time. Under the 4th Geneva Convention, occupying forces must provide healthcare to the populations of the territories they occupy.

Yet Palestinian officials seem reluctant to make a formal request to Israel to provide the vaccine, likely because asking for help from Israel is politically sensitive.

Also, the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s, which were meant to be a temporary road map to develop a Palestinian state, gave Palestinians responsibility for their healthcare.

Israel’s health minister reportedly told Sky News that the Palestinians simply need to “learn how to take care of themselves.”

He said that Israel has provided advice, supplies, and medicine to its neighbors, adding that it is in Israel’s best interest to reduce Palestinian case numbers, as many Palestinians work in Israel.

But some international organizations condemn Israel’s failure to provide the vaccine equitably.

According to Saleh Higazi, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director:

“Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program highlights the institutionalized discrimination that defines the Israeli government’s policy toward Palestinians. There could hardly be a better illustration of how Israeli lives are valued above Palestinian ones.”

The Palestinian government has arranged for vaccine shipments from four companies that should arrive this quarter. The state may also start receiving doses in February from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine schemeTrusted Source for low-to-middle-income countries.

Another issue complicating the vaccine rollout is the reluctance and fear among the country’s Arab and Orthodox populations regarding the vaccine and pandemic restrictions.

Vaccination rates are low among the Arab community in Israel.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are registering record high numbers of new cases of COVID-19. There are also reports of lax preventive restrictions in these communities, with some schools remaining open and multiple reports of large gatherings.

On January 20, the government announced the launch of a campaign to educate the Ultra-Orthodox community about pandemic risks and the importance of following the rules.​

All the billions given to the "Palis" and they can't get vaccines?

Billions?

I presume you can count what we and the UN have given the "Palis" since the 50s.

USA TODAY

www.usatoday.com

How much aid does the U.S. give Israel?
The United States has given Israel a total of $146 billion in bilateral assistance and missile defense funding through 2020, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), which provides nonpartisan research to lawmakers. That makes it the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign aid since World War II. (Other top recipients include Egypt and Afghanistan.

Israel has spent every penny building a state of the art nation that doesn’t need to beg for resources from other nations.

For your education:

U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL33222.pdf

I agree.
I say let Israel do the same work and sell it to the US for 10billion rather than take the 3.8B and give over the specifications.

$10 billion? Link?

 

[Sixties Fan]

Over the past two years, Scientific Americanhas published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an apartheid state and Zionism is white supremacy. #FreePalestine.”

As I wrote last week in The Algemeiner, a June 2, 2021, column — titled “As Health Care Workers, We Stand in Solidarity with Palestine” — was removed from the Scientific American website just hours after the publisher received a letter signed by more than 106 scientists and physicians, including three Nobel Laureates.


THE LETTER CRITICIZED SCIENTIFIC AMERICANEDITORS FOR PUBLISHING “ONE-SIDED POLITICAL PROPAGANDA,” IGNORING “EASILY VERIFIED FACTS,” AND COVERING “IMPORTANT HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES SUPERFICIALLY, INACCURATELY, AND PREJUDICIALLY.” A FULL TEXT OF THE NOW REMOVED COLUMN IS AVAILABLE HERE.

(full article online)

‘Scientific American’: A Publishing Home for Anti-Israel Hate and Propaganda - Algemeiner.com

Over the past two years, Scientific American has published a series of biased attacks on Israel, even accusing Israel of “vaccine apartheid and medical apartheid.” Such actions are not surprising considering that in 2021, a Senior Editor at Scientific American tweeted that “Israel is an...

www.algemeiner.com

NEWSLETTER

COVID-19 vaccine rollout in Israel: Successes, lessons, and caveats
Israel is a world leader in the race to roll out the COVID-19 vaccine. In this Special Feature, Medical News Today look at why the vaccine rollout has been so successful in Israel and discuss the controversies and equity issues related to the campaign.

EMMANUEL DUNAND/Getty Images
All data and statistics are based on publicly available data at the time of publication. Some information may be out of date. Visit our coronavirus hub and follow our live updates page for the most recent information on the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the United States has struggled to meet COVID-19 vaccine rollout goals, within just 2 weeks, Israel vaccinated almost 15% of the country’s population of more than 9 million.

As of January 19, 2021, 25.6% of the Israeli population have received their first vaccine dose, and 550,000 people have received both doses.

To give some perspective, Israel is vaccinating residents at a rate of 32.4 people per 100, compared with 4.8 people per 100 in the U.S., and 7 per 100 in the United Kingdom.

But why exactly has the rollout been so successful in Israel? And what can we learn from this early success? In this Special Feature, we review what is known about Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Early rollout successes
Israel’s success in rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine seems to be due to several factors influencing the access to and distribution of the vaccine.

The Israeli government started searching early on for a way to secure vaccine doses.

In June 2020, Israel became one of the first countries to sign a purchase agreement for a vaccine supply from Moderna. In November, the country announced additional vaccine deals with AstraZeneca and Pfizer.

The first Pfizer vaccine doses arrived in Israel on December 9, 2020, and vaccinations began on December 19, 2020. The country is still waiting for the other two vaccines.

Israel’s government also allegedly agreed to pay top dollar for vaccines and purchase millions of doses. Although the exact price is unknown, one official said that the price was about $30 per vaccine — double the average price abroad.

The makers of the vaccine that Israel is currently using — U.S. company Pfizer and German partner BioNTech — would not comment on the cost of the vaccine.

In exchange for an early, steady vaccine supply, the Israeli government also assured Pfizer that the country’s rollout would offer quick, large-scale results, promising to give the company detailed patient information on those receiving the vaccine in Israel.

Israeli officials expected Israel’s vaccine rollout to be successful because the country is small but has a vast healthcare infrastructure. The country also has a well-developed, universal healthcare system that connects all residents to a national digital health network.

All residents also have insurance from semi-private healthcare maintenance organizations (HMOs) that run services throughout the country, even in rural, remote regions.

Israel’s centralized, digitized system makes it easier to track and access information and roll out national healthcare agendas, such as vaccination campaigns.

“In a sense, Israel has become like a very large clinical trial,” Hadassah Medical Center virologist Dr. Rivka Abulafia-Lapid told The Times of Israel.

“Because everyone in Israel belongs to an HMO, and their records are kept along with their background data, this means we’ll get a good picture of responsiveness to the vaccine, in context of age, gender, and existing medical conditions,” Dr. Abulafia-Lapid added.


Distribution successes
Israel’s vaccine rollout success is also due in part to the handling of the vaccine and its delivery to citizens.

Those responsible for logistics have stored the vaccine doses underground near Israel’s main airport. They are in 30 large freezers, which are capable of holding 5 million doses.

Teams in Israel have also developed a way to repack doses from large, ultra-frozen pallets into insulated boxes roughly the size of a pizza box. Doing this has made it easier to distribute vaccine doses in smaller numbers and to remote sites.

Teams repack large vaccine pallets into bundles containing as few as 100 doses, which they then deliver to 400 vaccination centers. Healthcare professionals have also managed to obtain more vaccine doses out of each vial than Pfizer had initially advertised.

Pfizer have approved both of these processes.

Some 335 drive-through vaccination clinics also exist throughout Israel, allowing healthcare professionals to vaccinate larger groups of people quickly. On January 19, 2021, the country announced a new daily record of more than 210,000 vaccinations in 1 day.

Israel began vaccinating healthcare workers, teachers, people with medical conditions, and those over the age of 60 years. Now, the country is racing to vaccinate the entire population over the age of 16 years — equating to about 5.2 million people — by the end of March. As of January 20, Israel has started vaccinating residents over the age of 40 years.

At the time of writing, Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to more than 76% of the country’s inhabitants who work as teachers, are over the age of 60 years, or have health risks.


ADVERTISING

CORONAVIRUS NEWS
Stay informed about COVID-19
Get the latest updates and research-backed information on the novel coronavirus direct to your inbox.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Controversies
Despite these achievements, some people in Israel are regularly demonstrating against the government’s handling of the pandemic.

Hailed as a way to restore normalcy — and save the economy — the government calls the COVID-19 vaccine rollout “Operation Back to Life.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims that it will allow Israel to become the first country in the world to emerge from the pandemic.

However, it is less clear precisely how and when Israel will be able to revert to so-called normal life.

On January 19, the country reported a record high of more than 10,000 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day and a positivity rate above 10% for the first time in 3 months. Also, 30–40% of new cases are linked to the new COVID-19 variant that scientists first recognized in the U.K.

Israeli, currently in its third lockdown, also faces high levels of unemployment and a recession, but the authorities have extended the current nationwide lockdown until at least January 31.

Netanyahu’s political opponents also accuse the government of using the vaccine campaign for political gain before the upcoming election.

The country is on track to vaccinate everyone over the age of 16 years just 3 days before the election on March 23. In addition, the government is discussing postponing the election if infection rates stay high.

The government is also receiving criticism for not sharing enough details about what patient data it will share or how Pfizer will use the information.

Government officials only recently disclosed some terms of the deal, claiming that it will only share general data with Pfizer, such as data about the numbers of cases, serious cases, fatalities, and vaccinations, and each individual’s age and gender.

They also say that the data will help researchers assess and track herd immunity, with the results to feature in a recognized medical journal.

But Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute, expressed her worries that anonymized patient data, including complete medical histories, will be shared.

Although they will not bear patient names or identifying markers, she said that it is possible to de-anonymize the files. Treating these personal data as though they belong to the government in this way is “not ethically, not legally, and not morally

,” she added.


MEDICAL NEWS TODAY NEWSLETTER
Knowledge is power. Get our free daily newsletter.
Dig deeper into the health topics you care about most. Subscribe to our facts-first newsletter today.

Enter your email
Your privacy is important to us

Health equity issues
According to human rights groups, Palestinians living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip do not have access to the vaccine and will not for a long time. Under the 4th Geneva Convention, occupying forces must provide healthcare to the populations of the territories they occupy.

Yet Palestinian officials seem reluctant to make a formal request to Israel to provide the vaccine, likely because asking for help from Israel is politically sensitive.

Also, the Oslo Peace Accords of the 1990s, which were meant to be a temporary road map to develop a Palestinian state, gave Palestinians responsibility for their healthcare.

Israel’s health minister reportedly told Sky News that the Palestinians simply need to “learn how to take care of themselves.”

He said that Israel has provided advice, supplies, and medicine to its neighbors, adding that it is in Israel’s best interest to reduce Palestinian case numbers, as many Palestinians work in Israel.

But some international organizations condemn Israel’s failure to provide the vaccine equitably.

According to Saleh Higazi, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director:

“Israel’s COVID-19 vaccine program highlights the institutionalized discrimination that defines the Israeli government’s policy toward Palestinians. There could hardly be a better illustration of how Israeli lives are valued above Palestinian ones.”

The Palestinian government has arranged for vaccine shipments from four companies that should arrive this quarter. The state may also start receiving doses in February from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine schemeTrusted Source for low-to-middle-income countries.

Another issue complicating the vaccine rollout is the reluctance and fear among the country’s Arab and Orthodox populations regarding the vaccine and pandemic restrictions.

Vaccination rates are low among the Arab community in Israel.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are registering record high numbers of new cases of COVID-19. There are also reports of lax preventive restrictions in these communities, with some schools remaining open and multiple reports of large gatherings.

On January 20, the government announced the launch of a campaign to educate the Ultra-Orthodox community about pandemic risks and the importance of following the rules.​

All the billions given to the "Palis" and they can't get vaccines?

Billions?

I presume you can count what we and the UN have given the "Palis" since the 50s.

USA TODAY

www.usatoday.com

How much aid does the U.S. give Israel?
The United States has given Israel a total of $146 billion in bilateral assistance and missile defense funding through 2020, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), which provides nonpartisan research to lawmakers. That makes it the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign aid since World War II. (Other top recipients include Egypt and Afghanistan.

Israel has spent every penny building a state of the art nation that doesn’t need to beg for resources from other nations.

For your education:

U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL33222.pdf

Israel is the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign assistance since World War II.
Successive Administrations, working with Congress, have provided Israel with significant
assistance in light of robust domestic U.S. support for Israel and its security; shared strategic
goals in the Middle East; a mutual commitment to democratic values; and historicalties dating
from U.S. support for the creation of Israel in 1948. To date, the United States has provided Israel $146 billion (current, or
noninflation-adjusted, dollars) in bilateral assistance and missile defense funding. At present, almost all U.S. bilateral aid to
Israel is in the form of military assistance, although from 1971 to 2007, Israel also received significant economic assistance.

[From your source (what many Anti Israel Posters will not discuss]

Strategic Reasons for Continuing U.S. Support​

There is a broad bipartisan consensus among policymakers that Israel has advanced U.S. interest in the Middle East and beyond.

• Israel has successfully prevented victories by radical nationalist movements in Lebanon and Jordan, as well as in Palestine.
• Israel has kept Syria, for many years an ally of the Soviet Union, in check.
• Israel’s air force is predominant throughout the region.
• Israel’s frequent wars have provided battlefield testing for American arms, often against Soviet weapons.
• It has served as a conduit for U.S. arms to regimes and movements too unpopular in the United States for openly granting direct military assistance, such as apartheid South Africa, the Islamic Republic in Iran, the military junta in Guatemala, and the Nicaraguan Contras. Israeli military advisers have assisted the Contras, the Salvadoran junta, and foreign occupation forces in Namibia and Western Sahara.
• Israel’s intelligence service has assisted the U.S. in intelligence gathering and covert operations.
• Israel has missiles capable of reaching as far as the former Soviet Union, it possesses a nuclear arsenal of hundreds of weapons, and it has cooperated with the U.S. military-industrial complex with research and development for new jet fighters and anti-missile defense systems.

U.S. Aid Increases as Israel Grows Stronger​

The pattern of U.S. aid to Israel is revealing. Immediately following Israel’s spectacular victory in the 1967 war, when it demonstrated its military superiority in the region, U.S. aid shot up by 450%. Part of this increase, according to the New York Times, was apparently related to Israel’s willingness to provide the U.S. with examples of new Soviet weapons captured during the war. Following the 1970-71 civil war in Jordan, when Israel’s potential to curb revolutionary movements outside its borders became apparent, U.S. aid increased another sevenfold. After attacking Arab armies in the 1973 war were successfully countered by the largest U.S. airlift in history, with Israel demonstrating its power to defeat surprisingly strong Soviet-supplied forces, military aid increased by another 800%. These increases paralleled the British decision to withdraw its forces from “east of the Suez,” which also led to the massive arms sales and logistical cooperation with the Shah’s Iran, a key component of the Nixon Doctrine.

(full article online)

Why the U.S. Supports Israel - Institute for Policy Studies

In the United States and around the world, many are questioning why, despite some mild rebukes, Washington has maintained its large-scale military, financial, and diplomatic support for the Israeli occupation in the face of unprecedented violations of international law and human rights standards...

ips-dc.org