Coronavirus: Employees may close airport to prevent coronavirus mutation

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will take a proposal to the government on Sunday to ban all Israeli and foreign passengers from and out of Ben-Gurion airport amid fears about an increasing number of coronavirus mutations.

If approved by the government, restrictions will apply to passenger flights for 14 days.

British officials said the variant COVID-19 identified in England last month may be at an increased risk of causing death, although data are limited. So far, health officials said there was no evidence that it was more lethal or caused more serious illness.

Meanwhile, the Israeli Ministry of Health said it found through genetic sequencing that six out of seven pregnant women examined for the British mutation were infected with it. The ministry was waiting for the results for three more women.

“Practically, in terms of our daily lives, it means nothing,” Cyrille Cohen, head of the immunotherapy laboratory at Bar-Ilan University, told The Jerusalem Post on Saturday night, noting that Israel is already confined, wearing masks and social distance – and that the British variant is already in the country, so closing the airport would have no effect on that.

In addition, he noted that most studies show that the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine is effective against the mutation.

However, he said there are greater fears about the South African mutation, because some initial studies have shown that it may be able to resist antibodies developed by the Pfizer vaccine. Several cases of the South African variant were brought to Israel through the United Arab Emirates.

“It would be advisable to close, or at least limit air traffic as much as possible,” he told the Post. “We have vaccines”.

The Ministry of Health has been pushing for stricter controls at the airport for almost the entire pandemic. Over the weekend, the head of Public Health Services, Prof. Sharon Alroy-Preis, said that “the important point is that we realize that we cannot continue to allow the entry of variants that cause infection”.

The fear, which Cohen alluded to, is that the variants could go against the country’s vaccination program and impair its ability to emerge from the crisis – a sentiment shared in a report published on Saturday by the National Center for Information and Knowledge Coronavirus.

The report said that even with genetic sequencing capable of detecting when a patient is infected with a variant, most countries in the world are not able to track mutations as they develop. Furthermore, even countries that can identify variants do not know how to assess the danger quickly.

“The case of the British variant proved that, despite Israel’s rapid response after learning of its existence, it was too late to prevent its spread among the population,” said the report.

Thus, the center recommended that when traveling abroad, even people who have had the virus or been vaccinated should be careful to wear masks and social distance. In addition, it recommended avoiding unnecessary travel and treating arriving passengers who have been vaccinated and recovered like any other, requiring testing and potentially even a short period of isolation.

On Saturday night, at midnight, a government decision took effect requiring anyone who entered the country to have a negative coronavirus test.

On Friday afternoon, the Ministry of Health sent a memo explaining that anyone wishing to board a flight to Israel would be required to submit to the air carrier a coronavirus negative PCR test done within 72 hours of the flight, or a vaccination certificate provided by the ministry.

In addition, anyone who leaves Israel before seven days has passed since receiving their second injection of vaccine will be required to go into isolation according to the ministry’s guidelines on returning, the ministry said.

The rules apply to all incoming travelers, including those who have booked round-trip flights that keep them out of the country for more than 72 hours.

Exceptions will be granted on a case-by-case basis.

Despite the mutation, the number of confirmed daily cases of coronavirus continues to decline.

There were 7,326 new cases on Friday, informed the Ministry of Health on Saturday night, with 8.8% of people tested positive, which represents a slight drop compared to previous days. About 8.9% of people examined on Thursday had the virus, compared with 9% on Wednesday and 9.2% before that.

However, the ministry reported that only 85,739 people were tested for coronavirus on Friday and 81,828 on Thursday, as opposed to more than 100,000 in the previous days that resulted in 10,000 cases.

The highest rates of infection remain among the ultra-Orthodox community, where British and potentially other mutations are active. Jerusalem had the highest number of active cases with 15,197, Bnei Brak had 5,319 and Modi’in Illit had 3,119.

The percentage of positive cases is expected to continue decreasing, as the reproduction rate – the “R” or number of people infected by each patient – has finally dropped to less than one in all sectors.

As the numbers drop, the hope is that the blockade will be lifted as announced on January 31.

Coronavirus commissioner, Prof. Nachman Ash said on Thursday in an interview with Channel 12 that he is optimistic that no extension of the closure will be necessary.

“The data is encouraging,” said Ash. “We expect the trend to continue.”

There are currently 76,783 active cases of coronavirus in Israel.