The director of the infectious disease unit at Sheba Medical Center Prof. Galia Rahav said on Thursday that she would cancel the New Year's Eve celebrations in Israel amid the fast spreading COVID variant: Omicron wave.
Prof. Rahav appealed to the public in an interview on Ynet. "If you want to celebrate in large crowds, perform a quick COVID test, despite everything the FDA has said, or a PCR test, and make the parties small as possible," Rahav said.
Professor Rahav spoke about the fear of a rush on hospitals during the fifth wave. "There's an outbreak in a nursing home, so I can say for sure that some 10% will be hospitalized. True, not everyone in Israel is elderly or immunosuppressed, but even a few percent of a large number of patients will definitely overload the hospitals," she said.
Rahav also expressed her doubt that the government's decision to reduce quarantine for those who were fully vaccinated, and had come in contact with a confirmed COVID patient. "This is a little difficult for me to accept," she said.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) argued Wednesday that the rapid home tests for COVID were less sensitive to the detection of the Omicron.
"There is conflicting data," Rahav said. "Our data about those tests in Israel is actually positive, but I think we really need to review it. These things are really new and I think the FDA's statement is definitely worrying, I think we have to decide in a day or two whether they are reliable or not."
As for the child vaccination drive, Professor Rahav believes that vaccines should be much more accessible and more information should be made available to the public. "I think we need a more serious persuasion campaign," she said.
"At the moment, more kids are hospitalized with Omicron in South America, Britain and in the United States. Those countries are also reporting an increase in serious illness."
Rahav said vaccines were a vital defense also from long-COVID although there is little data about the post virus symptoms after disease caused by the Omicron variant.
"Vaccination, vaccination, vaccination, wearing masks, and as much social distance as possible," Rahav said when asked what should done going forward, to help the country through the current wave.