Biggest trauma
As of this week, it’s official: Shaare Zedek Medical Center has been recognized by the Health Ministry as an additional regional trauma center for Jerusalem and the region, the second after the Hadassah-University Medical Center, and the seventh-such center in the country.
Considering the growth in the population of the city and its surrounding region, it was just a matter of time to reach that step. The decision of the ministry was reached after a long and deep inspection as a follow up to work done in the hospital’s trauma unit in recent years. Most of the unit’s competence and experience were obtained during the traumatic years of multiple injury incidents in the city, as it was observed by the ministry’s test team.
Shaare Zedek’s Trauma Center has grown over the past 10 years and treated some 3,000 various cases of emergency and trauma during 2019, compared to some 1,000 cases in 2009. It is noteworthy that beside the two regional trauma centers of the capital, the five other centers are all located in the center of the country, leaving the North and the South without such crucial facilities.
No trauma at all
Newcomers were welcomed to the city and the world with the Jewish New Year, as 243 babies were born in two of the largest hospitals in Jerusalem. 110 babies were born in both Hadassah hospitals and 133 were born at the Shaare Zedek. The first delivery occurred on the eve of Rosh Hashanah at the medical center’s maternity ward, a baby girl, soon followed by 132 more during the two days of the festival (around three days total) and the happy and safe deliveries at the Hadassah medical centers in Ein Kerem and Mount Scopus. All babies born during this time were born to Jerusalemites.
Hospitals in trauma
Public hospitals in the country, including Hadassah and Shaare Zedek, were part of the special emergency conference held on the eve of the holiday calling upon the government – and more specifically the Health Ministry – to give them what they deserve in terms of budgets and staff standards required. According to the representatives of the Jerusalem hospitals, the city’s health institutions do not get what they need to meet the needs of the close to a million residents of the capital. According to Shaare Zedek CEO Ofer Marin, due to the lack of staff standards allowed by the ministry, about 10,000 patients could not receive the care they needed during the last year. Marin wondered at the end of the conference how it could be that nobody at the government seemed to be upset at that. In the framework of the protest of the public hospitals, it has been already a week that these institutions operate on a reduced format, and as a result treat only emergency cases. As of last Thursday, the CEOs of the protesting hospitals say that neither the health minister nor the Treasury have had any contact with them, but a few MKs from the opposition did show up.
Ups and downs
Deputy Mayor Arieh King is fuming at the decision of the coronavirus czar, who limited, in the framework of the High Holy Days outline, the number of worshipers allowed to say slihot at the Western Wall to 8,000, and only in separated capsules. “This outline is either the result of ignorance or, worse, of racism” said King. According to King, the limit on the number of participants once they arrive to the Western Wall plaza, while there is no limit or supervision on their transportation there, shows that there is no continuity in the framework of these events. King added that while the number of worshipers at the Western Wall is limited and supervised, nobody seems to care about the number of Muslims praying just above the Western Wall, where there is no supervision, capsules or implementing the use of masks.
Coming back home
The National Library of Israel-Jerusalem has recently managed to get back the mishna that belonged to the late Prof. Gershom Shalom, the world expert on Jewish mysticism. That came after Shalom’s Talmud was also brought back to Jerusalem and joined the large archive he donated to the NLI. Shalom was careful to type up a list of the books he brought with him when he came from Berlin in 1923 (they were more than 1,700), and that list is still in his archive at the NLI. Shortly after he passed away in 1982, most of his personal library came to the NLI, where it remains largely in the same order as it was in his apartment. Yet for years, his mishna was not to be found in the Gershom Shalom Collection. A few months ago, a woman from a seminary in Yeroham called the NLI and informed them that the seminary had recently received a number of donated books and among them was a mishna set with the ex-libris of Gershom Shalom. It turned out that the set had belonged to a couple who had lived on Kibbutz Saaad in the Western Negev. After they passed away, their children decided to donate many of the books they found in their home to the seminary. The set, published in Fürth in 1814, is complete (six volumes) and in outstanding condition.
Mapping our legacy
A beautiful initiative was launched by the Lev Ha’ir local council to map and identify all the historical buildings in the neighborhood. Lev Ha’ir includes Nahlaot, in cooperation with the Jerusalem branch of the Council for Conservation of Heritage Sites in Israel. The project will conduct a mapping of buildings and places of historical value in the neighborhood in order to tell their heritage story and the events of the period associated with them by placing heritage signs. This project integrates with a broader plan the local council management has been working on in recent months with the Jerusalem Municipality to upgrade the neighborhood and its buildings. This part of the project has already begun by restoring and carving the historic stone gates. Later on, it will also include renovating the infrastructure; street flooring; installing new lighting; planting trees; installing street furniture and cleaning and renovating facades, gardens and yards. Last but not least, it will also work on restoration of historical elements, treatment of neglected points and new solutions for the regulation of traffic and parking in the neighborhood.