Photo: A Magen David Adom EMT administers a fourth Covid booster in a nursing home.
Magen David Adom (MDA), Israel’s paramedic and Red Cross service, began administering fourth doses of the Covid vaccine Tuesday to seniors living in elder care facilities in an attempt to thwart the spread of the Omicron variant and to protect populations most at-risk to become seriously ill from the disease.
The rollout of the fourth dose comes as Israel’s confirmed cases of coronavirus is nearing the country’s all-time record, prompting the Ministry of Health to launch an initiative for the additional vaccine booster.
Israel is the first country to begin administering a fourth round of the vaccine, eligible to everyone at least 60 years old, health workers, and the immunocompromised, provided their last dose was at least four months ago. Nearly 6.6 million people of Israel’s 9.4 million have been vaccinated twice, and 4.3 million have received a third booster shot.
“From the beginning of the outbreak, MDA has stood at the forefront, providing the elderly population and the general Israeli public with a rapid, professional medical response in order to defeat Covid,” said Eli Bin, MDA’s director-general.
“We are proud to carry out this national mission, as requested by the Ministry of Health, to protect our grandparents, our parents, and friends.”
Magen David Adom has already vaccinated and tested millions of adults and children, and due to this current wave and rate of infection, has opened more testing sites throughout the country to meet excessive demand.
