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What We're Watching: Israel's fourth shot, Nordic NATO jitters, EU nuclear debate heats up

Fourth time’s the charm in Israel. As the COVID omicron variant sweeps the globe, Israel has become the first country to roll out a fourth vaccine shot for health care workers, immunocompromised residents, and people over the age of 60. (The eligibility criteria will likely be broadened in the weeks ahead.) Pushing back against those who say that more research is required to gauge the effectiveness of a fourth shot, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said that omicron is “a new ballgame altogether.” This comes as Israel's health ministry said recently that the country could soon reach herd immunity due to a combination of vaccination rates (64 percent of the population is fully vaccinated) and mounting infections (Bennett warned Sunday that daily infections could soon reach 50,000, up from the current daily caseload of 6,500). Israeli health officials say that although omicron’s spread is inevitable, the aim is to keep deaths and hospitalizations as low as possible by keeping inoculation rates sky-high. Will other countries follow suit?

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