The first Israelis infected with the deadly coronavirus have been reported.
Edited by; TJVNews.com
Israel is preparing to evacuate its citizens from the quarantined cruise ship Diamond Princess, the Health Ministry said Monday.
“We are working in coordination with the Japanese authorities, the Foreign Ministry and emergency bodies in order to bring the [Israeli] passengers on the ship back home safely,” said Health Minister Yaakov Litzman.
According to a statement from the ministry, a plane has already been chartered by several private insurance companies to bring the Israeli nationals back home.
World Israel News reported on Monday that just hours after Health Ministry director-general Prof. Itamar Grotto left for Japan to bring home Israelis trapped on the quarantined cruise ship Diamond Princess in Japan, Japanese authorities announced on Sunday that three of the Israelis are confirmed to have caught the deadly coronavirus.
Israel’s Health Ministry reported they had received word from Japan and that the Israelis have shown mild symptoms.
Health Ministry Deputy Director General Itamar Grotto and Israel’s Ambassador to Japan Yaffa Ben-Ari met in Tokyo on Monday with Japanese health officials in order to discuss the evacuation of Israeli nationals from the ship, according to the AP report.
The ministry said that Litzman had instructed the Sheba Medical Center in Tel Hashomer to prepare to take the Israelis into quarantine upon their arrival in the country. They will be kept in a separate unit and monitored by medical staff assigned solely for that purpose, the ministry added.
Prof. Elhanan Bar-On, director of the Israel Center for Disaster Medicine at Sheba, said: “Our expertise is in leading and handling national emergency tasks and that is what we shall do in this instance as well — professionally and responsibly.”
In total, 15 Israeli nationals were on the cruise, but Prof. Grotto told the Ynet news website that the three hospitalized Israelis would have to stay in Japan until they tested negative for the virus.
Japanese officials, meanwhile, confirmed Monday that 99 more people have been infected by the new virus aboard the Diamond Princess, bringing the total to 454.
Two chartered planes flew 340 Americans who were aboard the vessel out of Japan late Sunday. About 380 Americans had been on the ship. The US State Department announced later that 14 of the evacuees were confirmed to have the virus in tests given before they boarded the planes.
They were taken to the US because they did not have symptoms and were being isolated from other passengers on the planes, it said.
It wasn’t immediately clear whether the 14 were included in the 99 new cases announced by Japan on Monday.
“Based on the high number of COVID-19 cases identified onboard the Diamond Princess, the Department of Health and Human Services made an assessment that passengers and crew members onboard are at high risk of exposure,” the U.S. Embassy in Japan said, according to a World Israel News report.
Israel’s government has taken precautionary measures to prepare for the eventual arrival of the deadly virus to its shores.
On Feb. 2, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened a large-scale discussion including ministers, ministry director generals and all relevant staff officials on national preparations to deal with the coronavirus.
Netanyahu said following the meeting: “We have just concluded an in-depth and detailed discussion with all Israeli government officials on how to deal with the outbreak of the coronavirus.
“Our readiness will include all arms of the Israeli administration. Our foremost goal is to postpone the arrival of the virus to Israel. I say ‘postpone’ because its arrival is unavoidable. We will then identify, treat, isolate and deal with those infected.”
He said the coronavirus’ arrival was “unavoidable” despite the Chinese government’s efforts.
“We have closed land crossings, seaports and airports to arrivals from China; this is temporary,” he said at the time.
On Monday, the AP reported that China offered its figures to 1,886 new virus cases and 98 more deaths in its update Tuesday on a disease outbreak that has caused milder illness in most people, an assessment that promoted guarded optimism from global health authorities.
The update raised the number of deaths in mainland China to 1,868 and the total confirmed cases to 72,436.
Also on Monday, AP reported that the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention published a study of earlier cases of the disease, finding more than 80% of people infected had mild illness and the number of new infections seem to be falling since early this month.
Monday’s report gives the World Health Organization a clearer picture of where the outbreak is headed, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a news conference.
But he added it was too early to know if the reported decline would continue. “Every scenario is still on the table,” he said.
The seeming drop in the number of cases follow a large spike last week after hard-hit Hubei province began counting cases by doctors’ diagnoses without waiting for laboratory test results. Health authorities there said the change was meant to get patients treated faster.
The disease named COVID-19 emerged in December in Wuhan, Hubei’s capital, and the surrounding region has been put under lockdown to try to contain the outbreak. Transportation has been halted, thousands of hospital beds have been added, and military doctors and nurses have been deployed to staff facilities in the overwhelmed local health-care system.
China may postpone its annual congress, its biggest political meeting of the year. The standing committee for the National People’s Congress will meet Feb. 24 to deliberate postponing the meeting that is due to start March 5.
Two chartered planes flew 340 Americans who were aboard the vessel out of Japan late Sunday. About 380 Americans had been on the ship. The US State Department announced later that 14 of the evacuees were confirmed to have the virus in tests given before they boarded the planes.
They were taken to the US because they did not have symptoms and were being isolated from other passengers on the planes, it said.
It wasn’t immediately clear whether the 14 were included in the 99 new cases announced by Japan on Monday.
Australia, Canada, Hong Kong and Italy are also planning similar flights for their citizens.
The Health Ministry on Sunday said Israelis returning from four destinations in East Asia will now be required to self-quarantine for two weeks amid concerns over the spread of the novel coronavirus.
Travelers to Thailand, Singapore and the semi-autonomous Chinese cities of Hong Kong and Macau must remain in isolation, the ministry said. Previously, only travelers coming from China were subject to such a self-quarantine.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
