Voting in the time of corona: Israelis run Covid contest

Holding an election anywhere during a pandemic that has claimed almost three million lives was always going to be a challenge.

But even in Israel, where Covid-19 infections are plummeting because of effective vaccines, there are still precautions.

One innovation is the drive-through voting booth, pictured left. Vulnerable citizens or those isolating can still vote without leaving their cars.

“The voter won’t get out of the vehicle and a voting stand with ballots will be placed next to the car window,” an election official told The Times of Israel. “He’ll then drive 1.5 metres and a ballot box will be waiting for him. If two people come together, for example a couple who are both sick, one of them will be asked to get out of the vehicle.”

Other precautions include increasing the number of voting booths by 30 per cent compared to a normal election. But for some voters, the situation was already as grim as it could be. In Covid-19 wards in some hospitals, election officials and health workers wore protective gear to bring voting boxes to those infected.

Israeli civil society organisation Darkenu has developed the Democrator app which, once downloaded for free on Apple or Android, can be used to send friends and family a message, encouraging them to vote.

Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party has followed a more traditional approach: a canvassing campaign called Likudelet that mainly involves an effort to identify people who failed to vote in previous elections.

With Israel having approved an antiviral nasal spray to stop Covid-19, as well as demonstrating that vaccines are highly effective, we can look to a future where elections like this will be the exception.