Zavitan Stream reopens to public after danger of bacterial infection passes

A stream in the Golan Heights has reopened to the public following a health scare in Israel’s north that has seen several streams and nature reserves shuttered.

The Health Ministry announced that several successive tests of the Zavitan Stream’s waters had shown that the danger of infection with a potentially fatal bacteria had passed.

Other streams and parks closed due to the contamination remain closed.

Leptospirosis has been transmitted to people through animal urine in natural water sites, and five years of drought have exacerbated the contamination levels.

The main waters infected with the bacteria are in the Golan Heights and Upper Galilee, including the Zaki and Yehudiya streams, the Daliyot estuary, the Gilbon River and the Jordan River in the area of the Jordan park, near the Golan Heights.

The ministry has said that 42 people have been infected with leptospirosis and another 242 people are suspected to have contracted the disease.

Last week Israel’s national water company began pumping water into northern rivers in the hope of clearing the waterways.

The outbreak has dealt a serious blow to the local tourism industry at the peak of the vacation season.

Leptospirosis is transmitted to humans via the urine of mammals, usually from rats or mice, but also dogs, deer, cows and sheep. While the bacteria do not harm the host animal, in humans they can cause flu-like symptoms, including fever and chills, intense headaches, stomach pain and conjunctivitis, in milder forms. In a more severe form, it can degenerate into Weil’s disease, which causes liver damage, kidney failure, bleeding in the lungs and meningitis, and can been fatal if left without treatment.

Health experts suspect the spread of the disease was caused by the large number of wild boars in the Golan Heights, who had been driven by a persistent drought in recent years to huddle continuously next to streams and urinate in them.

The ministry has urged the public to remain calm, and has encouraged vacationers in northern Israel not to alter their plans despite the scare, stressing that there was no indication of infection elsewhere.