Israel’s “poster boy” for the mRNA Covid-19 vaccine died suddenly at age eight. Yonatan Moshe Erlichman suffered cardiac arrest on the eve of Yom Kippur and died several days later in the hospital.
Yonatan, the son and grandson of prominent Israeli doctors, appeared in a promotional video in 2020, urging Israelis to have the Covid vaccination. He was described by journalists as the poster child for the country’s response to the Covid-19 epidemic.
Israel had a very close relationship with Pfizer, the manufacturer of one of the mRNA vaccines. More than 70 percent of the population has received two doses of the vaccine following the government's agreement with the drug company to purchase 8 million doses.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed to provide Pfizer with epidemiological data to help it evaluate the effectiveness of its vaccine. He said Israel would be “the lab for Pfizer” because almost all the country's citizens have digitized medical records.