Israel: Fake news, lack of vaccinations causing rise of polio
All cases detected in Jerusalem, with infections slowly spreading to the rest of the country
There are “several” reasons for the recent outbreak of polio cases seen in Israel, where a total number of eight children were diagnosed with the disease since March.
Fake news, school closures, and a general skepticism towards vaccines is causing the rise in polio cases, Israel’s Head of Public Health Services Dr. Haron Alroy-Preis said at a Knesset Health Committee meeting on Sunday, according to the Jerusalem Post.
“Due to fake news, suddenly everything has a question mark over it. Even vaccines which we have had for years and which we’ve seen eliminate diseases, suddenly they are being questioned,” she said, stressing that particularly parents who prevent their children from being vaccinated are the most concerning and pressing issue.
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“The situation we are seeing in Jerusalem is not just a result of [closures during] Covid,” she said, referring to the routine vaccine program where children are getting vaccinated in school.
“There are whole communities who choose not to vaccinate, for ideological reasons or technical reasons. They have too many children to bring to get vaccinated, or the schedule is too much to keep up with.”
On March 8, a four-year-old child in Jerusalem tested positive for polio, the first recorded case in Israel since 1989. Since then, eight children were detected with the disease - all in the Jerusalem area.
However, the virus is spreading “slowly, slowly” from Jerusalem to the rest of the country, Dr. Haron Alroy-Preis told the Knesset according to the Israeli daily.
In Israel, the polio vaccine is available in two forms - an oral poliovirus vaccine, and an inactivated poliovirus vaccine.