Israeli Cabinet Minister walks back courageous statement on COVID deaths

Israel's Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked yesterday was interviewed by Channel 13 about her government's response to the first post-vaccination COVID infection wave. During the interview she said, "We have to know how to accept severe cases and also to accept deaths, because this is a pandemic and in a pandemic people die." Her comments seemed reasonable since indeed people do die when there is a respiratory illness circulating, and that government is not responsible for every death.However, with the heightened sensitivity surrounding COVID deaths, politicians and some in the media blasted Shaked for her "insensitivity" towards the deaths and her governments handling of the situation.Instead of explaining that there is a limit on what governments can do to control a respiratory illness, or that in a normal year approximately the same number of people die from flu-like illnesses, as have died in the past year, the Minister backtracked.After the interview, Shaked released a statement clarifying that “every death is a world unto its own, and human life is a supreme and sacred value” and that she was trying “to explain the price of continuing to deal with the global epidemic."