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On April 20, two months after the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic in Israel, the number of confirmed cases in the Bedouin city of Hura was zero. Only 70 tests were conducted in the low-rise Negev expansion, home to 21,000 people.
Twelve days later, while the infection rate decreased in most other parts of the country, 99 people had been diagnosed with the virus, according to the Ministry of Health; 110 according to local health officials. During the first weekend of May, there was a peak of 43.5 percent, after 897 tests were conducted there and in two other adjacent communities.
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According to the Health Ministry, as of Saturday, 16,152 Israelis had been diagnosed with the coronavirus, with 148 new cases registered in the past 24 hours. So far, 227 Israelis have died from the virus, 103 are in serious condition, 83 of which are on ventilators.
Hura residents are not surprised by the disconnect with the rest of the country: Here, even in normal times, the state has a hard time dealing with problems in the city.
The tests started late in Hura, with guidelines from the Ministry of Health that were not strictly followed, and many people continued to work. The outbreak began with a wedding attended by hundreds of people. Many of those infected belong to an extended family.
Even if all the infected appear to have been identified now and efforts are being made to isolate them, poor population registration in Hura makes it difficult to monitor the hotspots of infection and provide a definitive picture of the situation.
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Dr. Fuad al-Sana, who heads the southern Negev branch of the Clalit Health Maintenance Organization, says the use of technology in Bedouin communities is pointless. “I use realistic tools, not irrelevant. Mapping the location of people is more appropriate for the Jewish population, “he says.
Instead, al-Sana uses his familiarity with the tribes to try to combat the outbreak. “We use personal connections, ties to doctors and local leaders,” he explains. But the problems in registering the population have not been resolved.
He doesn’t like hotels
The methods used to prevent the spread of the virus are also difficult to implement. Only 40 percent of those who tested positive have agreed to move to a hotel used for quarantine purposes, although the opposition appears to falter as the situation deteriorates, al-Sana says.
Al-Sana attempted to have all evacuees transferred to one location, in Ashkelon, to maintain their sense of community. He believes that a place designated exclusively for Arabs would have made things easier. Two of those quarantine sites were established in Jerusalem and Nahariya, but they are too far away to be of use to Negev residents.
In some cases, entire families were evacuated to a hotel in Ashkelon after some members were infected, says the head of the Negev branch of the Arab Medical Association, Dr. Naim Abu-Freha.
“These families live in high density, and it is difficult to convince them to evacuate. Most of those infected are women. It is difficult to send them to a hotel, “says local council chief Habas al-Atouna, noting that it is culturally unacceptable to send a woman somewhere unsupervised. She tries to ensure that those who do not evacuate at least remain quarantined in their homes.
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