Israel wants to distribute up to 30 million free rapid corona tests to its citizens. The offer is aimed primarily at financially weaker sections of the population among the approximately 9.4 million inhabitants, the government announced on Tuesday. Schoolchildren, families in need, students and senior citizens in particular should receive the antigen test kits. Distribution should start next week. Responsible for this are, among other things, the Ministry of Social Welfare and the Homeland Security Command.
The week before last, Israel had massively restricted the PCR test obligation due to the overload of the PCR test stations. Since then, large parts of the population have only had to do antigen tests if they have come into contact with a person infected with corona. However, an antigen test recently cost around six euros. According to media reports, the government is trying to lower prices.
The number of new corona infections had risen to almost 50,000 cases per day in the past week. However, the Ministry of Health has not published any new figures since Sunday evening – according to media reports due to the system being overloaded due to the high number of cases. According to the Ministry of Health, only around 62 percent of the population in Israel are still fully vaccinated.