Israel’s Health Ministry ordered Sunday all hospitals to reopen their coronavirus wards.
It issued a report citing the rapid and significant increase in number of infections last week, including 349 people, which is the highest daily increase since April.
It recorded 33 cases on Sunday, raising the number of infections in Israel since the virus’s outbreak to 20,686.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced “harsh expectations for the new wave.”
Chairing the cabinet session on Sunday, the Premier stressed that in light of intelligence report, a coronavirus cabinet session will be held on Monday to discuss the steps required to contain the pandemic’s outbreak with minimal damage.
He, however, urged citizens to be aware of the virus’s seriousness and take all the necessary, precautionary measures.
“If we don’t change our behavior immediately and begin to wear masks and keep a distance from each other, the lockdowns will return. None of us want that,” Netanyahu stressed.
This comes following a report issued by Israel’s Army Military Intelligence Directorate (Aman) stating that Israel has entered a second wave of the coronavirus pandemic and threatening it would triple the death toll.
“Israel is currently experiencing a second wave of coronavirus, which differs in its characteristics from the first wave, but is no less severe,” said the report, adding that if no urgent action is taken in the foreseeable future to combat the outbreak, the daily infection numbers could reach up to 1,000.
It called for immediate steps to ensure that the economy is not closed again after just one month.
The report used the word “war” to describe the fight against coronavirus. It pointed out that the number of infections doubled 20 times during the past week.
The Coronavirus National Information and Knowledge Center highlighted in its report that a few weeks ago, those newly infected were coming from specific social strata, such as schoolchildren and education staff, foreign workers, and rural residents, but this seemed to have expanded in other wider and larger directions.
“The Ministry finds hardships in tracing and isolating those infected, being residents, unlike in March when it places the repatriated only in these centers.”
The education sector has also suffered a great blow. Last week, 39 new schools were closed as a precautionary measure, raising the number of closed schools to 215.
Also, 41 new coronavirus cases were recorded among students and teachers, bringing the total number of infections to 714.
