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JERUSALEM, April 17-- Israel reported 224 new COVID-19 cases on Friday, bringing the total confirmed cases in the country to 12,982, Israel's Ministry of Health said. Eight new deaths were recorded, raising the country's death toll from the novel coronavirus to 151. The latest figures show a significant decline in the number of patients in serious condition, to 168 from 180 on Thursday. Also, the number of ventilated patients dropped from 136 to 122, the ministry said. The number of recoveries in Israel reached 3,126, after 308 new recoveries were added on Friday. The ministry announced that it had bought 2.4 million serological test kits, costing 110 million new shekels (about 30.6 million U.S. dollars). The test kits were purchased from the U.S. medical devices company Abbott Laboratories, and DiaSorin, an Italian biotech group specialized in in-vitro diagnostics. | 
