Decline in new cases attributed to booster vaccinations.
By Aryeh Savir, TPS
The effect of the third Pfizer-developed booster vaccine administered to over 3,634,000 Israelis in recent weeks is apparently taking effect, and the country documented the lowest number of new COVID-19 cases since the end of July.
The Health Ministry updated Wednesday that it documented only 2,502 new cases in the past 24 hours, and a decreasing 2.32% of the tests done on Tuesday returned positive.
A bit over half of the new cases, 1,349, were school children. About 94,000 students are unable to attend school, 75,650 because they are in quarantine, and 18,386 because they are active patients.
16 Israeli cities are still considered Red with high infection rates, all of them Arab, where the vaccination rates are low.
487 COVID-19 patients are hospitalized in serious condition, of whom 190 are on life support. The majority of the patients were not vaccinated or did not receive the third booster shot.
Since the outbreak of the pandemic, 7,855 Israelis have died of the Coronavirus, including seven on Tuesday.