A new coronavirus mutation has been identified in Israel, the Health Ministry reported Wednesday morning, saying it is a combination of the BA1 strain (Omicron) and its subvariant, BA2 (sometimes referred to as "stealth Omicron").

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Officials identified two such cases when testing arrivals at Ben-Gurion International airport. No other country has reported similar cases.

Both individuals exhibited light symptoms, including fever, headache, and muscle pain. Neither required special medical attention.
The ministry said it was closely monitoring the strain.

Coronavirus Commissioner Salman Zarka said about the strain, "This phenomenon occurs when two new strains meet, they reproduce and take traits from both strains. The infection most likely happened in Israel. A young woman infected a baby and her parents. The two flew abroad and when they returned, their test results at Ben-Gurion airport were tested for new variants, which is when the new strain was revealed."

When asked about the severity of the new mutation, Zarka said, "Omicron is very contagious compared to the Delta, it is still here and the reproduction rate began to rise even before the new strain [was detected.] Those who got infected have recovered already, and until now we have seen a light disease … We continue to monitor the phenomenon, but at this stage, we are not very concerned about the new mutation."

Due to the recent increase in the reproduction rate, Zarka called on the Israeli public to don masks indoors, follow health guidelines, and get vaccinated.

On Wednesday morning, the Health Ministry reported 6,310 news cases. Altogether, 57,708 Israelis were screened for the virus in the past 24 hours, which puts the infection rate at 10.93%.

There are 37,557 active cases in the country with 789 patients hospitalized. Of those, 335 are in serious condition.

Thus far, 736,786 Israelis have been vaccinated with four doses, 4,469,410 with three, 6,124,888 with two, and 6,700,861 have received one shot.

Israel has reported 3,734,462 cases, including 10,401 deaths, since the outbreak of the pandemic in March 2020.

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The Omicron coronavirus wave continues to decrease in Israel with 9,120 new cases reported by the Health Ministry on Friday morning. Altogether, 76,601 Israelis were screened for the virus in the past 24 hours, which puts the infection rate at 11.91%.

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There are 93,350 active cases in the country with 1,437 patients hospitalized. Of those, 653 are in serious condition: 276 are critically ill, 230 are on ventilators and 24 are connected to ECMO machines. Currently, 34,158 Israelis are in self-isolation.

Thus far, 725,541 Israelis have been vaccinated with four doses, 4,462,974 with three, 6,119,901 with two, and 6,698,743 have been inoculated with one shot.

Israel has reported 3,604,835 COVID cases, including 10,108 deaths, since the outbreak of the pandemic in March 2020.

As Omicron begins to wane in other countries worldwide as well, governments begin to ease restrictions on public life.

In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to announce Friday a change to the metrics it uses to determine whether to recommend face coverings, shifting from looking at COVID case counts to a more holistic view of risk from the coronavirus to a community.

Under current guidelines, masks are recommended for people residing in communities of substantial or high transmission – roughly 95% of US counties, according to the latest data.

The new metrics will still consider caseloads, but also take into account hospitalizations and local hospital capacity, which have been markedly improved during the emergence of Omicron. The strain is highly transmissible, but indications are that it is less severe than earlier strains, particularly for people who are fully vaccinated and boosted.

Under the new guidelines, the vast majority of Americans will no longer live in areas where indoor masking in public is recommended, based on current data.

Iceland too is expected to lift all remaining COVID restrictions on Friday, including a 200-person indoor gathering limit and restricted opening hours for bars, the country's Health Ministry said on Wednesday.

"Widespread societal resistance to COVID-19 is the main route out of the epidemic," the ministry said in a statement, citing infectious disease authorities.

"To achieve this, as many people as possible need to be infected with the virus as the vaccines are not enough, even though they provide good protection against serious illness," it added.

All border restrictions would also be lifted, it said.

Iceland, with a population of some 368,000 people, has registered between 2,100 and 2,800 daily infections recently. More than 115,000 infections have been logged throughout the epidemic and 61 have died due to COVID-19.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organization has signed a contract with Deutsche Telekom subsidiary T-Systems to build a software solution for global electronic verification of coronavirus vaccination certificates, the telecoms company said on Wednesday.

The QR code-based software solution will be used for other vaccinations as well, such as polio or yellow fever, T-Systems said in a statement, adding that the WHO would support its 194 member states in building national and regional verification technology. The financial details of the transaction were not disclosed.

"Health is a strategic growth area for T-Systems," said T-Systems Chief Executive Officer Adel Al-Saleh.

T-Systems previously worked with SAP to develop Germany's Corona-Warn-App tracing and verification app and a Europe-wide digital COVID-19 vaccine verification system.

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The coronavirus infection wave continued to decrease in the past 24 hours, according to the latest Health Ministry data. On Monday, 123,001 Israelis were screened for the disease, of whom 23,555 tested positive. The morbidity rate stands at 19.15%.

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There are 178,118 active cases in the country with 2,155 patients hospitalized. Of those, 974 are in serious condition – 338 are critically ill, 279 are on ventilators and 27 are connected to ECMO machines. Currently, 35,854 Israelis are in quarantine.

Thus far, 699,505 Israelis have been vaccinated with four doses, 4,456,018 with three, 6,113,744 with two, and 6,696,058 have received one dose.

Israel has reported 3,460,914 cases, including 9,624 deaths, since the outbreak of the pandemic in March 2020.

However, while the Omicron-fueled morbidity wave seems to be in retreat in Israel, a new wave of infections from the strain is moving towards the east of Europe, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday, urging authorities to improve vaccination and other measures.

Over the past two weeks, cases of COVID-19 have more than doubled in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Russia, and Ukraine, WHO's Europe regional director Hans Kluge said in a statement.

The comments come at a time when several European countries including the Czech Republic and Poland have hinted at easing of COVID-19 restrictions next month if daily infection numbers kept falling. 

The WHO, however, stressed the continued need for measures such as rapid testing and masking, saying over 165 million COVID-19 cases have been recorded so far across the WHO European region, with 25,000 deaths in the past week.

"Faced with the Omicron tidal wave, and with Delta still circulating widely in the east, this worrying situation is not the moment to lift measures that we know work in reducing the spread of COVID-19," Kluge said.

He also called on governments to examine local reasons for low vaccination rates. Less than 40% of those aged over 60 in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan have completed their COVID-19 vaccine series, he said.

In related news, new data shows that the immune response to COVID-19 helps protect against reinfection, but that protection is weaker against Omicron than it was against earlier variants of the coronavirus. 

A previous SARS-CoV-2 infection protects against Omicron reinfection only 56% of the time, researchers found in a review of national data in Qatar. Having had COVID was 90.2% effective against reinfection with the Alpha variant, 85.7% effective against a Beta variant reinfection, and 92% effective against Delta reinfection, researchers reported on Wednesday in The New England Journal of Medicine.

As was the case with reinfection due to earlier variants, however, "the protection of previous infection against hospitalization or death caused by reinfection [with Omicron] appeared to be robust," they said. In cases of reinfection with Omicron, for example, the immune response to previous infection was 87.8% effective at preventing the second infection from progressing to severe or critical illness or death.

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The Health Ministry reported 46,347 coronavirus cases on Friday morning. Altogether, 185,992 Israelis were screened for the virus in the past 24 hours, which puts the infection rate at 24.92%. The reproduction rate stands at 0.9, the same as the day before. 

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There are 373,160 active cases in the country with 2,715 patients hospitalized. Of those, 1,132 are in serious condition. Currently, 73,229 Israelis are in self-isolation. 

Thus far, 658,505 Israelis have been vaccinated with four doses, 4,446,649 with three, 6,101,459 with two, and 6,692,301 have received one shot.

Israel has reported 3,094,984 cases, including 9,080 deaths, since the outbreak of the pandemic in March 2020. Since Thursday morning, 67 Israelis have lost their life due to COVID.  

Meanwhile, a new study by researchers from Bar Ilan University and the Galilee Medical Center founds a strong link between vitamin D levels and the severity of COVID. 

Scientists concluded that vitamin D deficiency significantly increases the risk of serious illness or death upon contracting the virus. The findings were published on Thursday in the peer-reviewed journal PLOS One.

"We found it remarkable and striking to see the difference in the chances of becoming a severe patient when you are lacking in vitamin D compared to when you're not," Dr. Amiel Dror, a Galilee Medical Center physician and Bar Ilan researcher who was part of the team behind the study, told The Times of Israel.

The study is based on research conducted during Israel's first two waves of the coronavirus before vaccines became widely available.

Another Israeli study published last summer came to similar conclusions about increased chances of becoming seriously ill or dying with COVID if there is vitamin D deficiency. 

The research conducted in a Galilee hospital found that 26% of coronavirus patients with vitamin D deficiency died versus 3% for other patients.

"What we're seeing when vitamin D helps people with COVID infections is a result of its effectiveness in bolstering the immune systems to deal with viral pathogens that attack the respiratory system," Dror said. "This is equally relevant for Omicron as it was for previous variants."

In related news, South Africa – where the Omicron strain was first detected – is seeing more cases of the BA.2 subvariant, sometimes called "stealth Omicron", with no clear indication that it is substantially different from the original mutation, a senior scientist said on Friday.

Michelle Groome, from the National Institute for Communicable Diseases, showed in a presentation that BA.2 accounted for 23% of the 450 samples from January sequenced by South Africa's genomic surveillance network and the original strain 75%.

Of the 2,243 samples from December that were sequenced, BA.2 accounted for 4% and the original strain 94%.

"We are seeing this increase with the BA.2, we are still trying to get more information on this particular sub-lineage ... and so we are increasing sequencing from those provinces where we are seeing increases [in cases] monitoring the proportion that is due to BA.2," Groome told a news conference.

"At this stage, there is no indication that there would be ... differences between these different sub-lineages of Omicron. As we saw with Delta there were lots of lineages and we didn't see a lot of difference between them, but we will keep monitoring," she added.

Asked whether there were signs BA.2 was causing different symptoms, she said she was not expecting marked changes, adding that scientists will analyze hospitalization data for clues about the severity of illness linked to the subvariant. 

i24NEWS contributed to this report.

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Over 9,000 Israelis have died since the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic two years ago, according to Health Ministry data published on Thursday morning. The current death toll stands at 9,013 cases, which means that one in 1,000 Israelis have lost his or her life to COVID.

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As for the infection rate, it stands at 28.56%, with 60,537 Israelis having tested positive for the disease in the past 24 hours, of the 211,987 tested altogether. The reproduction rate decreased slightly and stands at 0.9.

There are 434,322 active cases in the country with 2,733 patients hospitalized. Of those, 1,147 are in serious condition. Currently, 80,745 Israelis are in quarantine, including 890 doctors and 1,948 nurses.

Thus far, 652,887 Israelis have been vaccinated with four doses, 4,445,084 with three, 6,098,496 with two, and 6,691,702 have received one shot.

Israel also surpassed the three million caseload mark since the outbreak of the pandemic. It has reported 3,049,005 infections since March 2020, including 9,013 deaths.

Meanwhile, the IDF Home Front Command continues to monitor the spread of the highly infection BA.2 Omicron subvariant.

"The strain continues to spread in countries worldwide, currently without a uniform pattern," it said. "Due to its high transmission rate and [countries'] delay in caseload reports, its actual spread is considered to be more significant than reported."

In South Africa, the country that first detected Omicron, but that also first reported a decrease in its infection wave, has said recently that BA.2 cases are on the rise, making up 30% of daily caseloads. The offshoot now makes up most of the cases in Denmark, where BA.2 began spreading in mid-January. The subvariant has also been reported in India, Qatar, and the Philippines.

Professor Cyrille Cohen, head of the Immunotherapy Lab at Bar Ilan University, said his team has been following the new mutation.

"We have received reports that in very rare occurrences, people that were infected with Omicron could also… be infected with BA.2," he said stressing that although such reinfections do occur, they are uncommon.

Cohen also added that the BA.2 offshoot differs from Omicron in subtle ways. BA.2, often dubbed "stealth Omicron" by the media, is commonly referred to as a relative of the strain – a COVID variant that is largely considered to be milder than previous offshoots.

"Compared to Delta or Alpha, Omicron is a very mild variant in terms of severe disease," Cohen said, expressing hope that through natural exposure and vaccines, the morbidity wave could ebb.

He also seconded the government's decision to phase out the use of the so-called "green pass" vaccine certificates, which grant vaccinated or recovered COVID patients access to some public spaces, given the spread of the virus in Israel.

i24NEWS contributed to this report.

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The post Israel passes grim mark of 9,000 COVID deaths, 3 million cases, as Omicron rages nationwide appeared first on www.israelhayom.com.

The coronavirus infection rate decreased slightly in the past 24 hours and currently stands at 26.15%, according to Health Ministry data published on Wednesday morning. Altogether, 230,715 Israelis were screened for the virus on Tuesday, of whom 60,329 tested positive.

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The reproduction rate, which refers to the number of people each confirmed carrier infects, also decreased slightly and now stands at 0.91. Any value below 1 means that the infection is subsiding.

There are 435,189 active cases in the country with 2,763 patients hospitalized. Of those, 1,085 are in serious condition – 316 are critically ill, 260 are on ventilators and 17 are connected to ECMO machines. Currently, 91,239 Israelis are in quarantine, of whom 6,644 are healthcare personnel, including 914 doctors and 2,199 nurses.

Thus far, 647,831 Israelis have been vaccinated with four doses, 4,443,628 with three, 6,096,034 with two, and 6,691,819 have received one shot.

Israel has reported 2,987,977 COVID cases, including 8,926 deaths, since the outbreak of the pandemic in March 2020.

Ministry data also showed that several Israelis who recovered after contracting the Omicron variant went on to get infected with its subvariant BA.2. As such, experts fear that the antibodies created after the Omicron infection do not protect one against its mutation. Similar data was also reported in countries worldwide.

Although it is not yet clear whether BA.2 is more dangerous than the original Omicron strain, it is thought to be about 1.5 times more infectious. Countries that detected the subvariant have since reported an increase or renewal in morbidity. A Danish study that analyzed coronavirus infections in more than 8,500 Danish households between December and January said that not only is BA.2 more infections, it is also more resistant to vaccines.

Nevertheless, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday that the subvariant does not seem to be any more severe than the original BA.1 form.

Dr. Boris Pavlin of the WHO's coronavirus response team told an online briefing that the subvariant is already becoming dominant in the Philippines, Nepal, Qatar, India, and Denmark.

He added, "Vaccination is profoundly protective against severe disease, including for Omicron. BA.2 is rapidly replacing BA.1. Its impact is unlikely to be substantial, although more data are needed."

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyeus also said on Tuesday that 90 million cases of COVID have been reported since Omicron was first identified 10 weeks ago – amounting to more than in all of 2020, the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

With many countries easing their restrictive measures amid public fatigue about them, Ghebreyeus cautioned that Omicron should not be underestimated even though it has been shown to bring less severe illness than earlier variants – and cited "a very worrying increase in deaths in most regions of the world."

"We are concerned that a narrative has taken hold in some countries that because of vaccines – and because of Omicron's high transmissibility and lower severity – preventing transmission is no longer possible and no longer necessary," he told a regular WHO briefing on the pandemic.

"Nothing could be further from the truth," Tedros added. "It's premature for any country either to surrender or to declare victory. This virus is dangerous and it continues to evolve before our very eyes."

WHO said four of its six regions worldwide are seeing increasing trends in deaths. And yet, many European countries have begun easing lockdown measures, including Britain, France, Ireland, and the Netherlands. Finland will end its COVID-19 restrictions this month. Denmark's government scrapped most restrictions aimed at fighting the pandemic this week, saying it no longer considers COVID-19 "a socially critical disease." The nation of 5.8 million has in recent weeks seen more than 50,000 new cases a day, but the number of patients in intensive care units has declined.

Also on Tuesday, Pfizer drug manufacturer asked the Food and Drug Administration to authorize extra-low doses of its COVID-19 vaccine for children under five, potentially opening the way for them to start receiving shots as early as March.

Pfizer aims to give children as young as 6 months shots that contain one-tenth of the dose given to adults. The company said it had started submitting its data to the FDA and expects to complete the process in a few days.

The FDA said it will convene a panel of independent researchers and physicians in mid-February to help review the Pfizer data. The agency isn't required to follow their advice, but the input is a key step in publicly vetting vaccine safety and effectiveness.

Meanwhile, the Knesset ruled on Monday that the so-called "green pass" vaccine certificates will only be checked at the entrance to public events where there is a high risk of contagion, such as weddings held indoors. The ruling will go into effect next Sunday.

The government also decided that Israelis who have gotten vaccinated with the booster shots will be eligible for the pass indefinitely. For those who received only two doses, the pass will be valid for four months.

Lawmakers also ruled that COVID tests will no longer be mandatory for unvaccinated Israelis traveling abroad, though they may still be necessary in the destination country.
Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said at the meeting that the vaccines were "working well against severe illness and infections" as the reproduction rate is on the decrease.

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In related news, medics and nurses staffing Israel's coronavirus wards have recently lamented the shortage of manpower in parallel to the influx of patients.  

"The staff is exhausted," Yoram Weiss, acting director-general of Hadassah Medical Center in Jerusalem, said. "It's not like at the beginning of the pandemic when everybody was full of energy."

COVID wards have been filling up fast while numbers of staff due to Omicron, which has also sent many healthcare workers into quarantine, affecting the quality of care.

"We have on average 10-15% fewer doctors and nurses, while we need 20-30% more because of the flood of patients," Dror Mevorach, who heads Hadassah's coronavirus ward, told Reuters.

The shortage has also forced hospitals to divert resources to COVID wards, cutting back on other procedures, and in mid-January, several scientists urged the government to intervene to reduce infection rates.

They warned that the sudden influx of severely ill patients – most aged over 60 and many with serious pre-existing health conditions – would overwhelm a chronically under-resourced health system. 

But the government, backed by other experts and with almost 65% of Israel's 9.4 million population vaccinated with a recent booster jab or second dose, has stuck to the softer-touch "living alongside COVID " approach to managing the virus that it adopted last summer.

It has rolled back restrictions while urging the public to self-test and stay at home if they are sick – mirroring moves in several Western nations such as Britain and France.

In January, it cut isolation times and cut quarantine for schoolchildren exposed to a carrier.

For Dvir Aran, a biomedical data scientist at Technion – Institute of Technology in Haifa, the government's moves have been "like watching a train wreck in slow motion".

But other professionals welcome what they see as a call for citizens to take personal responsibility while arguing that any restrictions are likely to have only a limited impact on the highly contagious Omicron.

"The government shouldn't be running a kindergarten, ensuring you stay home when you're sick," Yael Haviv-Yadid, head of the critical care ward at Sheba Medical Center said. 

"Be responsible. Wear a mask and get vaccinated," she said.

i24NEWS contributed to this report.

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Israel has signed a deal to purchase 5 million doses of a COVID vaccine produced by the American drug manufacturer Novavax Inc.

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Novavax's two-dose, protein-based vaccine can provide an alternative to those Israelis hesitate to be vaccinated with an mRNA vaccine or cannot do so for medical reasons.

The Health Ministry said this would provide an element of "technological diversity" to the country's coronavirus strategy.

The vaccine will be given in two doses and will be subject to regulatory approval in Israel.

Based on early research data, Novavax's vaccine is effective in generating an immune response against the Omicron variant.

"We are encouraged that boosted responses against all variants were comparable to those associated with high vaccine efficacy in our Phase 3 clinical trials," said Gregory M. Glenn, Novavax's president of research and development.

The Novavax purchase comes as a subvariant of the Omicron strain has the world worried.

On Friday, Britain's Health Security Agency said that BA.2 subtype of the Omicron coronavirus variant appeared to have a substantial growth advantage over the currently predominant BA.1 type.

UKHSA said that there was an increased growth rate of BA.2 compared with BA.1 in all regions of England where there were enough cases to compare them, and that "the apparent growth advantage is currently substantial."

"We now know that BA.2 has an increased growth rate which can be seen in all regions in England," said Dr. Susan Hopkins, Chief Medical Advisor for the UKHSA.

The agency said there was no data on the severity of BA.2 compared to BA.1, but reiterated that a preliminary assessment did not find a difference in vaccine effectiveness against symptomatic disease between the two Omicron subtypes.

A US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention statement issued Friday confirmed that nearly half of US states had confirmed cases of the BA.2 subvariant but that the strain was still at "low levels" in the US.

The CDC warned that the BA.2 strain was 1.5 times as contagious as the original Omicron strain.

Meanwhile, the Omicron wave in Israel showed signs of receding on Sunday, with the reproduction rate at 0.95 for the first time since the eruption of the fifth wave, according to Health Ministry data.

At Sunday's cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said, "We are seeing the Omicron wave start to stabilize. I am choosing my words carefully to avoid a sense that everything is over and inappropriate end-of-Omicron celebrations. At the moment, we are dealing with overcrowded hospitals and a very large number of new cases."

The Health Ministry reported that tests processed Saturday confirmed 45,258 new COVID cases. The percentage of tests that came back positive for the same 24-hours period stood at 27%.

As of Sunday morning, 1,069 COVID patients were hospitalized in serious condition nationwide, 241 of whom were on ventilators.

Nearly half a million (461,929) Israelis were defined as active or symptomatic cases, and there were 138,016 people in quarantine at home. Over the weekend, 9,900 people were vaccinated, including 2,300 children and 5,400 people who received a second booster shot.

Israel Hayom has learned that the Israel Teachers Union plans to ask that schools that still haven't received shipments of rapid antigen tests be exempted from the government's new quarantine guidelines. ITU chairwoman Yaffa Ben-David was scheduled to meet with Education Minister Yifat Shasha-Biton and senior Health Ministry officials at 1 p.m. Sunday.

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In other COVID news, the news site Politico reported Friday that the administration of former US President Donald Trump created a secret list while planning for COVID vaccine distribution, prioritizing certain countries over others.

According to the report, the list favored Israel and other allies such as Taiwan over low-and moderate-income countries.

The list was split into several sections, including US strategic allies, countries that helped develop the vaccine, countries with relationships with Gavi – the global vaccine alliance –  and all other countries.

Officials told Politico that the documents were passed on to the Biden administration, saying that it "does not use the previous administration's policy or the cited list to make vaccine sharing decisions."

The list was an annex to a longer document laying out the Trump administration's international approach to facing COVID, planning the distribution of the vaccines based on political preference.

"We thought that the categories themselves made sense at the time," said Paul Mango, the former deputy chief of staff for policy at the Department of Health and Human Services, according to Politico.

"The underserved countries were third on the list."

The list included an assessment of the country's ability to "absorb and distribute doses and to what degree they were experiencing outbreaks."

"We identified categories and we put weights to them, and then subject matter experts from each [agency] came in and informed those categories," one former Trump official said. "From there, we had a panel of experts score each country based on the evidence provided."

Erez Linn and i24NEWS contributed to this report

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Pfizer has begun a study comparing its original COVID-19 vaccine with doses specially tweaked to match the highly contagious Omicron variant.
Pfizer and its partner BioNTech announced the study on Tuesday.

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COVID-19 vaccine makers have been updating their shots to better match Omicron in case global health authorities decide the change is needed.
While Omicron is more likely than previous variants to cause infection even in people who have been vaccinated, it is not yet clear that a change to the vaccine recipe is needed.

The original vaccines still offer good protection against severe illness and death. Studies in the US and elsewhere have made clear that adding a booster dose strengthens that protection and improves the chances of avoiding a milder infection.

"We recognize the need to be prepared in the event this protection wanes over time and to potentially help address Omicron and new variants in the future," Kathrin Jansen, Pfizer's vaccine research chief, said in a statement.

The new US study is enrolling up to 1,420 healthy adults, ages 18 to 55, to test the updated Omicron-based shots for use as a booster or for primary vaccinations. Researchers will examine the tweaked vaccine's safety and how it revs up the immune system in comparison to the original shots.

In one study group, about 600 volunteers who received two doses of the current Pfizer vaccine three to six months ago will receive either one or two Omicron-based shots as boosters. Another 600 who have already gotten three regular doses of the Pfizer vaccine will be given a fourth dose of either the regular vaccine or the Omicron-matched version.

The study also will enroll some unvaccinated volunteers who will receive three doses of the Omicron-based vaccine.

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Israel on Wednesday passed the grim milestone of 2 million coronavirus cases since the first positive test was recorded on Feb. 21, 2020, according to the latest Health Ministry data.

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While the total number of documented coronavirus infections since the start of the pandemic stands at 2,006,131, the actual number is likely much higher as the Jewish state struggles to keep its database coordinated with the rapid spread of the Omicron variant.

Of the 458,232 Israelis who tested for the virus Wednesday, 71,844 were found to have the disease, for an infection rate of 17.07%. There are 388,3923 active cases of the virus. There are 541 people in serious condition, 105 of whom are on ventilators. 

Although 1,638,440 Israelis have recovered from the virus, 8,362 have died.  

Around 145,000 students are currently confirmed to have COVID, while some 142,000 are now in quarantine due to having been exposed to a confirmed carrier. 

In a press conference Wednesday, Health Minister Nitzan Horowitz said, "We expect a short wave whose peak we will see soon, after which there will be a decline. We must adhere to the guidelines in the coming weeks. 

"We are providing all the tools: a consistent supply of vaccines, medicines that go from the healthcare providers to patients' homes, and testing on a massive scale of 400,000 [tests] a day. We have embarked on a huge initiative to distribute millions of home tests for free. It's a matter of social solidarity. We are both maintaining health and the market. We will continue to balance health, the economy, and democracy," he said.

Health Ministry Director-General Nachman Ash acknowledged the overwhelming nature of the highly infectious Omicron strain fueling the current fifth wave in an interview with Tel Aviv-based 103FM Radio Tuesday.

"Our estimate is that there are at least two or three times [the official daily case count]," said Ash. "It is not impossible that we're at 200,000 verified cases a day."

In the interview, Ash predicted that the current outbreak would peak "in another week or so."

He also warned daily cases would increase in the coming week as he noted serious cases requiring hospitalization were on the rise.

Meanwhile, the Health Ministry has released new findings that point to children and adolescents vaccinated against COVID-19 being better protected against the Omicron variant than the unvaccinated.

The study, conducted in collaboration with the Weizmann Institute of Science, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer's Gertner Institute, found vaccines administered in the past few months to be effective against the ultra-contagious variant.

Children aged 5 to 11 who received two doses of the Pfizer vaccine were half as likely to be infected with Omicron than unvaccinated children, the study found. 

Additionally, adolescents aged 12 to 15 who received a booster dose within the last two months were four times less likely to be infected than those who did not.

In total, only about 12% of children aged 5 to 11 in Israel have received two doses of vaccine, and less than 12% of children aged 12 to 15 have received three doses.

Over 4.3 million people have received three doses of vaccine, and over 530,000 people have received four doses.

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Prime Minister of Britain Boris Johnson announced Wednesday the end of COVID-19 measures introduced to curb the rapid spread of the Omicron variant in the country, looking to transition to life alongside the virus. 

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Britain was the first country to limit international travel over Omicron, raising alarm about its high infection rate, and in December encouraged work from home, more mask-wearing and vaccine passes to slow its spread.

But while cases soared to record highs, hospitalizations and deaths have not risen by the same extent, in part due to Britain's booster rollout and the strain's lesser severity.

Johnson's approach to avoiding lockdowns and living alongside the virus contrasts with China and Hong Kong's zero-tolerance policy with regard to COVID, and tougher restrictions in many other European countries.

"Many nations across Europe have endured further winter lockdowns... but this government took a different path," Johnson told lawmakers, saying the government had got the toughest decisions right and that numbers of patients in intensive care were decreasing.

"Our scientists believe it is likely that the Omicron wave has now peaked nationally ... because of the extraordinary booster campaign, together with the way the public have responded to the Plan B measures, we can return to Plan A."

Johnson said that none of the so-called Plan B measures would remain, as face masks would no longer be legally enforced anywhere, COVID passes would not be mandatory, and work from home not be encouraged. 

The prime minister has faced criticism for his handling of the pandemic overall as Britain has reported 152,513 COVID deaths, the seventh-highest total globally. Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland have followed their own anti-coronavirus measures, generally with tougher restrictions, but have also begun to ease them.

Johnson hopes to reset his agenda following furor over the lockdown gatherings at his office, which was followed by calls on him to resign. Johnson admitted he attended a party in the garden of his Downing Street office and residence in May 2020 while social gatherings were banned.

The lifting of Plan B measures, along with Johnson's navigation of Omicron without resorting to a stringent lockdown, could help him appease vocal opponents of restrictions in his own caucus amid the party unrest.

He said that if data supported it, he may end the legal requirement for people to self-isolate if they test positive before the regulation lapses in March.

"But to make that possible, we must all remain cautious during these last weeks of winter," he said, warning of continued pressure on hospitals. "The pandemic is not over."

A third of Britain's 15 million cases have been reported since the onset of Omicron. By contrast, the country has reported 5% of its COVID deaths since the mutation was identified in late November.

"The idea was by really trying to put a lot of impetus on the booster program, it would be possible ride it out without the most coercive methods," Professor Francois Balloux of University College London's Genetics Institute, told Reuters.

"In terms of morbidity and mortality, I think it could be seen as probably the right decision."

Meanwhile, Sweden set a new daily record for COVID-19 cases, registering 37,886 cases on Jan. 18, health agency data showed on Wednesday as an infection wave mounted across the country.

The previous record of 26,566 cases was set on Jan. 12. The record came despite limited national test capacity.

Kronoberg, one of Sweden's 25 healthcare regions, said on Wednesday it would pause all testing except for hospital and elderly care patients and staff.

Sweden, with 10.4 million inhabitants, recorded 67 new deaths since Tuesday, and 28,176 deaths since the outbreak of the pandemic.

The government announced new restrictions this month as Omicron spread rapidly and put a strain on Sweden's healthcare.

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In related news, the US government will make 400 million non-surgical N95 masks from its strategic national stockpile available for free to the public starting next week, a White House official said, marking the Biden administration's latest effort to help curb the pandemic.

The face masks will be shipped to pharmacies and community health centers this week, the official said, and available for pickup late next week.

The move comes after President Joe Biden and his team faced criticism for failing to foster masking or bolster testing as Omicron raged across the country.

Addressing that criticism and the wave, the administration has made free tests available via a website that launched officially on Wednesday in addition to its announcement about deploying masks from the strategic reserve.

"This is the largest deployment of personal protective equipment in US history," the official said. "To ensure accessing these masks is easy and convenient, the administration is leveraging the federal retail pharmacy program and the federal community health center program, so that free masks are available at many of the same convenient and trusted locations Americans go to get vaccinated and boosted."

The masks will be available at tens of thousands of pharmacies and thousands of community health centers with supplies available by the end of next week, the official said. "The program will be fully up and running by early February."

Masks like the N95 that form a seal around the nose and mouth are considered especially effective at preventing virus spread. Last week the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended that Americans wear "the most protective mask" that they can.

Biden's team previously said there is ample supply to share the masks.

Hospitals have recovered from the desperate N95 shortages of the early pandemic, but several executives told Reuters that healthcare supply chains remain fragile and that small and poorly funded hospitals are at most risk if Americans make N95s their "everyday" masks.

US mask makers told Reuters they have the machines to make millions of N95s each month.

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