Covid-19 vaccinations have been distributed quickly in Israel
Credit: Nir Keidar/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
Israel will pause its world-leading coronavirus vaccination drive for three weeks in January, the health minister said on Thursday, following local media reports that the Pfizer vaccine would run out within 10 days at the current rate.
More than 800,000 people have received their first dose of the vaccine in 11 days, making up over 7.4 per cent of the population. For the past two days, they have passed their target of vaccinating over 150,000 people a day.
More than 30 per cent of the over-60s have already been vaccinated and the country is on track to inoculate everyone in that age bracket within the next 10 days if they continue at a pace of above 100,000 a day.
But as shortages loom, the health ministry has been forced to announce that they will mostly stop administering first doses between January 10 and January 31 to ensure that there is enough stock to give the second dose to the people who have already received the vaccination.
Israel had aimed to open the vaccination to the general public within a week but the delay may now push that back by up to six weeks, according to Channel 12 news.
Instead, Hezi Levy, the health ministry’s director-general told Kan news that come February there may be a limited widening of the vaccination drive, perhaps with the age threshold lowered to 50.
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu had said last week that he aimed to have 2.25 million Israelis out of a population of 9.2 million vaccinated by the end of January.
Yuli Edelstein, Israel’s health minister, told Channel 12 news before yesterday’s announcement that “even if we were to stop for two weeks” Israel would still be far ahead of any other country in inoculations per capita.
According to statistics from the Our World in Data website second place is currently held by Bahrain with 3.37 per cent, followed by the UK with 1.18 per cent.
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