- Covid-19 vaccination rates are down and cases are on the rise, exacerbated by the more transmissible Delta variant.
- and an expert says the key to winning the race against the spread is getting more Americans vaccinated.
Madeline Holcombe writes for CNN about the impending dangers of slowing Covid 19 vaccination rate and rising Delta variant cases in the U.S.
Time to act fast
“We’re losing time here. The Delta variant is spreading, people are dying, we can’t actually just wait for things to get more rational,” Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health told CNN on Wednesday.
In Arkansas, the top official at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences sounded the alarm Thursday on current Covid-19 infection and hospitalization rates in the state.
Impact the Delta variant on hospitalizations
Chancellor Cam Patterson views
Hospitals are full right now and cases are doubling every 10 days.
If that trend continues, there will be significant challenges in providing care for both Covid and non-Covid patients over the next two weeks.
While hospitals have the ability to add more ICU beds, staffing is an acute issue.
Vaccines are available, only 50% of the U.S. vaccinated
Vaccines have been available to most Americans for months, but still only 48.3% of the country is fully vaccinated, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the rate of new vaccinations is on the decline.
It was down 11% from a week ago and is less than a quarter of the pace from two months ago.
Meanwhile, case rates have been going up dramatically.
In 47 states, the rate of new cases in the past week is at least 10% higher than the previous week, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. A total of 35 states have seen increases of more than 50%.
The numbers speak positively about vaccines, expert says
Officials and experts have said disinformation is largely to blame for the high number of unvaccinated Americans, a group that is seeing the largest impacts of the pandemic.
“This is not just a matter of people expressing opinions that might be wrong, this is life and death,” Collins said.
Much of the data now shows that more than 99% of people currently hospitalized with Covid-19 are unvaccinated, Collins said.
That means those who are vaccinated have enough protection that they aren’t getting severely ill, Collins said.
And the vaccines are still showing signs of being very effective against the Delta variant, he said, which is one of the greatest concerns for health experts currently.
Hoping for the best
Collins said he hopes the American public will pay attention to the data and decide that getting vaccinated is the safe and smart thing to do.
“I hope people will hear this, right now listening to this: If you are on the fence about whether vaccination is going to help you, listen to those numbers,”
Collins said. “Why are we waiting folks? Let’s roll up our sleeves if we haven’t already done so.”
The United States’ top doctor
“Health misinformation has cost us lives,” US Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy said at a White House briefing.
Murthy urged tech companies to monitor misinformation more closely and take action against “misinformation superspreaders.”
He also asked people to check sources before reposting Covid information on social media.
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Source: CNN
