JERUSALEM, Aug 20 — In Israel’s Covid-19 wards, doctors are learning which vaccinated patients are most vulnerable to severe illness, amid growing concerns about instances in which the shots provide less protection against the worst forms of the disease.
Israel began offering booster doses to people age 60 and up in July, and has since expanded that eligibility. In contrast, “the unvaccinated Covid patients we see are young, healthy, working people and their condition deteriorates rapidly,” she said. “Suddenly they’re being put on oxygen or on a respirator.”
Health officials in the UK and United States, two other nations with high vaccination rates and a spike in Delta infections, have reported similar trends. The World Health Organization has repeatedly urged wealthy nations to refrain from providing boosters while much of the world has yet to access their first Covid vaccine doses.The Delta variant, first identified in India, has become the dominant version of the SARS-CoV-2 virus globally, accelerating a pandemic that has killed more than 4.4 million people.
Among three million vaccinated Israelis covered by Clalit, the country’s largest healthcare provider, 600 have suffered severe breakthrough cases since June. Around 75 per cent of them were above the age of 70 and were at least six months after their second dose, according to Ran Balicer, Clalit’s chief innovation officer. Nearly all of them have chronic illnesses.In the UK, doctors described similar characteristics among vaccinated patients who fall severely ill.