Ynet reports former Prime Minister Ehud Barak suggested that Pfizer and other drug manufacturers are using the Israeli population as a test subject, and that Israel has willingly made itself available for this purpose.
According to Barak, it is not thanks to Prime Minister Netanyahu that Israel procured so many doses of vaccine while larger nations have to wait. Rather, "Pfizer found the perfect location for its pilot program in Israel," claimed Barak.
The former prime minister stated that Israel's state-sponsored health insurers have decades of health and vaccination records on almost all Israelis. So if someone in a high-risk group is given the vaccine and then dies, it is much easier to identify a background disease or condition as the cause of death.
“This data is a treasure trove for Pfizer. With this data, Pfizer can show that it vaccinated an entire high-risk population in a country with no deaths wholly attributable to the vaccine,” Barak said.
According to Barak, "Managing the COVID-19 crisis was a failure. A failure of management, of leadership and of personal example."
He referred to the vaccination campaign and said: "All in all, this is a welcome thing and I want to congratulate all those involved in the work - the HMOs, Pfizer representatives, and the Prime Minister. But, don't be confused. Netanyahu didn't bring the vaccines, but Pfizer found the right place for their pilot: Kupot Holim."
Barak explained: "There are health funds here that hold data 40 years back on all vaccinated people in my age group. Two-thirds of this age group are in the data. There's no such thing anywhere in the world. It's a huge asset to Pfizer, because it lets them show that when someone dies after being vaccinated - and people my age tend to die more often - he didn't die because of the vaccine, but as a result of some background illness.
"These data are a treasure, which is why Pfizer, with deliberate intent, put Israel first to receive the vaccine. Not because of Netanyahu's talks with the CEO.
"Pfizer can show that they have taken an almost complete country, and vaccinated the entire risk layer. Anyone who dies later can be checked whether it had a connection to the vaccine or a background illness."
Former IDF Medicine Corps head and current Public Health Experts Chairman Prof. Hagai Levine tweeted a similar admission: "It's natural that the most vulnerable populations aren't participating in the experiment. This says nothing about the nature of the experiment.
"It is also another demonstration of the vital need to assess vaccine efficacy in living conditions on a large scale, including regarding preventing mortality."