A country-wide measles outbreak apparently has yet to be contained. A school principal in the predominantly ultra-Orthodox city of Bnei Brak has contracted the virus, forcing authorities to urge hundreds of pupils, including children in pre-school and first grade, to get vaccinated.
On Thursday, the Health Ministry dispatched a team of nurses to administer vaccinations at six preschool groups at the school. Vaccinations were also expedited for children in the first grade and up at the school. The Health Ministry was also trying to locate hundreds of people who had potentially come into contact with the infected principal so they could be vaccinated, as well.
The ministry addressed the latest measles incident in a statement, saying that "the school [in Bnei Brak] has been requested to check the vaccination status of its students and accelerate the vaccination process for first grade pupils and six preschool groups at the school. A ministry team has been sent to vaccinate the children. The infected individual had also recently attended a bar mitzvah ceremony, a wedding, and synagogue, and everyone who has been in contact with him has been asked to come in and get vaccinated."
Meanwhile, the Health Ministry's Rehovot branch reported that a woman who was at the Rishon Lezion Magistrates' Court on Sunday, Jan. 13 between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. was also infected with the virus. She was at the same court the following day (Jan. 14) from 7 p.m. and 11 p.m. The woman also spent several hours at the College of Management Academic Studies in Rishon Lezion on both those days. Ministry officials asked anyone born after 1957 and who hasn't been vaccinated twice who might have come into contact with the woman to report immediately to their nearest clinic to get tested.
Over 3,230 Israelis have contracted measles since the beginning of 2018. In November, a toddler died of measles in Jerusalem. An 82-year-old woman also died from complications of measles..
At the height of the outbreak in October 2018, 948 people were infected. Another 942 were infected in November. In December, 610 people contracted the disease and thus far in January 81 people have been infected.
Lawmakers have sought new legislation to keep unvaccinated children from spreading infectious diseases.
One bill, which was written in conjunction with the Israeli Medical Association and presented to the Knesset in October by MK Merav Ben-Ari (Kulanu), seeks to amend the existing public health directive to give the director general of the Health Ministry the authority to declare a public health emergency in the event of an epidemic of infectious disease and instruct schools not to allow unvaccinated children to attend.
Under directions from the Health Ministry, heads of schools and nursery schools would be able to bar unvaccinated children or staff members from the premises for the period of the declared health emergency. The law, if passed, will apply to any educational institution in which five or more children are enrolled, including day-care centers, private nursery schools, city-run nursery schools, and primary and secondary schools.
In November, the Health Ministry summoned five doctors in for urgent clarification on suspicion that the "information dispensed by them to the public discourages people from vaccinating adults and children, misleading the public and harming public health."
