IDF: For first time since coronavirus outbreak, no soldiers are sick
Following an intensive vaccination campaign in Israel and within the military, about 80% of troops have been vaccinated.
By ANNA AHRONHEIMAn IDF soldier is seen getting the coronavirus vaccine.(photo credit: IDF SPOKESPERSON'S UNIT)
For the first time since the coronavirus outbreak last year, no soldiers are sick with COVID-19, and fewer than 100 are in quarantine, the IDF announced Sunday.About 80% of soldiers have been vaccinated against COVID-19, it said.Soldiers have not been ordered to get vaccinated, but they are urged to.The military reached herd immunity in March, it said.“The vaccination campaign, which was a complex and rapid medical techno-logistical operation, made the IDF the first vaccinated military in the world, and today we see another milestone in which the IDF becomes an army without coronavirus patients,” Maj.-Gen. Itzik Turgeman, head of the IDF’s Technology and Logistics Division, said in a press release.It was “a significant milestone in the fight against the virus,” IDF Chief Medical Officer Brig.-Gen. Prof. Alon Glazberg said, adding that the Medical Corps “will continue to keep our finger on the pulse and maintain the health of the service members for their sake and to enable the IDF to carry out its mission in the best possible way.”The IDF had its first confirmed coronavirus case in March 2020 and confined soldiers to their bases several times over the past year in an attempt to keep the virus at bay. Nevertheless, thousands of service members, including civilian workers, were infected, and several bases had coronavirus outbreaks.Thirteen new cases of coronavirus were confirmed on Saturday out of a total of 9,236 tests that were conducted, the Health Ministry reported Sunday. At last count, 6,365 Israelis had died from COVID-19.
