An outbreak of the Delta variant of COVID-19 in Israel has spread to vaccinated people — with about half of the adults infected fully inoculated with the Pfizer shot, a health official said.
Ran Balicer, who heads a COVID-19 government advisory committee, said that about 90% of new infections in the country were likely caused by the Delta variant, a highly-contagious strain that first emerged in India, the Wall Street Journal reported.
“The entrance of the Delta variant has changed the transmission dynamics,” Balicer said.
Children under the age of 16 — the majority of whom had not received the vaccine –were responsible for about half of the new cases, Balicer said.
But about half of adults infected in the outbreak were considered fully-vaccinated — meaning that it had been at least two weeks since they received their final dose of the Pfizer shot, he said.
Balicer added that the so-called breakthrough cases were expected because the Pfizer is highly-effective but not 100% protective against the virus.
The spread of the Delta variant comes as daily cases rose to 200 on Thursday from around 10 a day for most of June, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Though the outbreak is small by global standards, it has prompted the government to order indoor mask mandates, the newspaper reported.
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