Fact Check: Israeli Data Do NOT Show ‘Zero Young Healthy Individuals Died Of COVID-19’ — Only Fraction Of Statistics Available

Partial Data

Do Israeli data show “Zero Young Healthy Individuals Died Of COVID-19”? No, that’s not true: While the risk of severe illness or death from COVID-19 is generally higher among older individuals or those with pre-existing health conditions, it does not mean that young and healthy individuals are completely immune to the virus’s severe effects. Additionally, the Israel Ministry of Health said the available data represented less than 10 percent of young people who died from COVID in Israel. “We know from clinicians that young healthy people did die from COVID,” the Ministry has stated.

The claim appeared in an article posted to Twitter (archived here) by ZeroHedge on May 29, 2023, titled “Zero Young Healthy Individuals Died Of COVID-19, Israeli Data Show.” The description for the article in the post said:

‘Zero deceased of 18-49 years of age with no underlying morbidities,’ the Israel Ministry of Health (MOH) said in response to a formal request from an attorney.

This is what the post looked like on Twitter at the time of writing:

(Source: Twitter screenshot taken on Tue May 30 15:38:02 2023 UTC)

As can be seen, immediately above, the tweet got a strong boost from Twitter owner Elon Musk, who echoed the claim, “Zero …,” from the headline of the story that said, “Zero Young Healthy Individuals Died Of COVID-19, Israeli Data Show.”

The MoH responded directly to the tweets by ZeroHedge and Musk, challenging the conclusions of the article that were drawn from a document from the Knesset Research and Information Center. The Knesset is the parliament of Israel and the center’s job is to provide “members with professional, reliable, and objective information in-house.”

Israel’s MoH called ZeroHedge’s interpretation of the partial data and Musk’s endorsement of it “fake news.” In a string of three tweets, the ministry said:

1. Elon, unfortunately this is not what the whole data shows.
fake news is dangerous.
Israel Ministry of Health was asked on chronic disease data and explained that we don’t have access to clinical records >>>

2. We provided the limited data available if something was shared during epidemiological investigation – this data was available for only 27 people -7.5% of the 356 young people who died of COVID In Israel >>>

3. We know from clinicians that young healthy people did die from COVID and hopefully data on that will be available on the near future from our HMOs.

MoH’s direct response to Musk, who was reacting to the ZeroHedge tweet, can be seen below:

(Source: Twitter screenshot taken on Tue May 30 18:16:47 2023 UTC)

In its response to the ZeroHedge article and Musk, the MoH said it was questioned by the Knesset Research and Information Center about chronic disease information, clarifying that it doesn’t have access to clinical records. The MoH said it shared the limited data it had, which was only available for 27 individuals, representing less than 10 percent of the 356 young people who died from COVID in Israel in the 18-49 age group. The MoH acknowledged that although young and healthy individuals did succumb to COVID, they are hopeful that more comprehensive data from health maintenance organizations in the country will be accessible in the near future.