Some 21,000 Israelis have tested positive for coronavirus since Sunday, in addition to 10,000 positive antigen test results in the same time period, the Health Ministry reported Monday.
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There were 133,928 active or symptomatic patients nationwide.
A total of 608 COVID patients were hospitalized, including 222 in serious condition – up from 203 on Sunday – and 71 in critical condition. There were 58 COVID patients on ventilators and 12 attached to ECMO machines.
Since the pandemic hit Israel in early 2020, 8,269 Israelis have died of the virus.
The reproduction rate (R) of coronavirus stood at 1.95, the ministry reported. Meanwhile, 120,000 children were either positive for the virus or in isolation awaiting test results.
Over 1,500 hospital staff, including doctors and nurses, were out of work because of the virus or because of suspected infections. On Sunday evening, Health Ministry Director-General Professor Nachman Ash told hospital directors that in the next few days, a decision would be made about shortening mandatory self-isolation for hospital workers who test positive for COVID.
Ash also said that nursing students, paramedics, and IDF soldiers from special hospital assistance units would be sent to hospitals to assist with transfer of patients and test processing.
The IDF medical officer for the Southern District explained that the main purpose of the hospital assistance units was to liaise between the IDF Home Front Command and the country's hospitals in states of emergency.
"Almost all the medical centers in Israel have one of these units, which is attached to its professional staff, and together, they provide solutions for all the patients," he said.
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Meanwhile, Israel sought on Sunday to ease access to home COVID-19 tests after a decision allowing most vaccinated people to use the kits to decide whether or not to self-isolate led to shortages in shops.
"We are mindful of the public's distress," Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said at the weekly cabinet meeting, announcing that every child in kindergarten or elementary school in Israel would be issued will three free kits in the coming days.
The government was also negotiating price reductions with major pharmacy chains, Bennett said, adding: "In any event, costs will come down in the near future because the market will be flooded with millions of kits that will arrive in Israel."
The kits cost around 25 shekels to 35 shekels ($8 and $11) in Israeli stores, many of which have reported running out. Ash told 103 FM Radio that unit price should be no more than 10 shekels ($3).
With a surge in COVID-19 infections and hours-long queues at mandatory testing stations, Israel last week said PCR and professionally-administered antigen tests would only be required for people over the age of 60 or with weak immune systems. Other vaccinated people could now rely on home tests.
But there was some skepticism about efficacy.
Channel 12 News reported that a Defense Ministry technology team had found that the kits missed 47% of confirmed COVID-19 carriers and had a false-positive rate of 37%. A ministry spokeswoman declined comment.
Salman Zarka, Israel's pandemic-response coordinator, said self-testing and self-reporting would compromise efforts to track cases. "We will not know the scale of morbidity with the home antigen kits," he told Kan radio.
