The COVID-19 pandemic reached Israel by February 2020, and measures have been taken ever since to control its spread and protect the population from serious morbidity. In March 2020, a national state of emergency was declared and lockdown restrictions were enforced. Keeping tight surveillance on disease spread, hospitalized patients, and mortality allows informative decision-making, evaluation of protective measures, and keeping the public as safe as possible.
We routinely analyze data from electronic health records (EHRs) from Maccabi Health Services (representing a quarter of Israel’s population; over 2 million people) and summarize COVID-19-related clinical information. We produce daily reports that contain information such as number of new COVID-19 patients, rate of positive SARS-CoV-2 tests, mapping areas with high positive test rates, stratification of disease severity of hospitalized patients, and more.
We will continue to analyze real-world data of the Israeli population during this COVID-19 pandemic and contribute to the efforts of making the right decisions in order to maintain good public health.