People like Yael Kakon are said to need more than 24 hours a day. Four times a week, after she finishes the morning shift at the Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya where she works, she volunteers as an ambulance driver and medic at Magen David Adom.
Read more:
She returns to her house in the evacuated town of Shlomi, near the border with Lebanon, late at night. Despite it being an evacuated 'ghost town' for the past two months, she lives there with her husband, Gad, who also works at the medical center. It's clear to the two of them that due to their essential work they will not leave their home. And that's not all. They also have eight children (four of them foster children), one of whom is a soldier fighting in Gaza.
5 View gallery
Due to danger of missiles, mortars from Hezbollah, Shlomi was evacuated until further notice
(Photo: AP)
Kakon, 50, works at the medical center as support staff in the urology department. With the outbreak of the war, the department was moved to the underground complex, which makes the work especially challenging, yet interesting. In the afternoon, at the end of the morning shift, she gets to her ambulance and starts another long shift of saving lives and providing first aid to the sick and the wounded in the surrounding towns. And if her schedule isn't packed enough, she is also studying health systems administration at Ramat Gan College.
"Due to my David Magen Adom shifts, I only work morning shifts at the hospital," she explains. "In the ward, I am part of the nursing sector and take care of the patients as if they were my parents or siblings. I basically do almost everything a nurse does, except give medicine. I am like their parent."
"During these days, working in an underground complex is not easy, and I'm sure I will remember this period for the rest of my life," she adds.
5 View gallery
Yael Kakon from Shlomi is a "special person with an amazing giving capacity"
(Photo: Roni Albert, Galilee Medical Center)
Dalia Tedgi, director of nursing at the Galilee Medical Center, testifies that "together with her colleagues in the urology department, Yael has been working for the past two months under challenging conditions in the underground complex," and she is full of pride in the dedicated worker.
At the end of her shift at Magen David Adom, at 11 p.m., Kakon goes home with the ambulance. "I'm on call 24/7, and even at work I received permission that if, God forbid, something happens, I can leave everything and drive away with the ambulance. My children and grandchildren are scattered in the northern region and my son, Or, is a reservist serving in Gaza and I pray every day that he is healthy and returns safely."
About five months ago, Kakon attended a paramedic course, after which she started driving an ambulance. "I volunteer at the Shlomi station as a driver and medic, but I feel much more than that, like a kind of shift manager. The work involves taking care of a lot of people; I help them and reassure them. I actually manage the event, whether it's a car accident or other trauma cases. As part of volunteering, I also drive an intensive care car, with a senior paramedic and the medical equipment is also different."
5 View gallery
Yael Kakon drives an ambulance in her second job to save lives
(Photo: Roni Albert, Galilee Medical Center)
Last week, after she finished her shift at the medical center and was driving the ambulance in the direction of Shlomi, she heard a deafening noise, not far from her, and realized she had almost been hit by an incoming mortar coming from Lebanon.
"I was alone in the ambulance, and behind me was a car with reservists, who signaled me to stop. I immediately put on a vest and we hid behind the bushes. Until now I don't understand how I got out of it alive. The next day I said the 'gomel' blessing in the synagogue in the hospital. It was one of the scariest moments of my life," said Kakon.
5 View gallery
IDF returns fire after Hezbollah launches mortars at Israeli towns
(Photo: Yoav Zitun)
During the weekend, after long weeks of work, she is reunited with her large family "We had a family Shabbat in Haifa, after three weeks of not seeing them. It was a real project. The soldier came from Gaza, it was the second time I had seen him since the war broke out."
"Yael is a very special person with an amazing giving capacity," says Bat Sheva Goaz, deputy director of the Asher Region in Magen David Adom. "Since the beginning of the war, she has not left us even for a moment, and the same is true for the medical center and her home in Shlomi. Her work at the hospital and Magen David Adom is another expression of the special relationship between us and the Galilee Medical Center, which has lasted for many years."