The United States is reporting a sharp spike in Covid cases as the highly infectious Delta variant of the coronavirus targets the unvaccinated people across the country.
The sudden rise in the cases comes in the wake of the lowest rates reported in June after months of a hopeful vaccination campaign to contain the pandemic that hit the country early last year.
The latest data, compiled by Johns Hopkins University, shows the new cases averaged 43,700 per day over the past week, which means a 65% rise over the week before.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky has called the Delta variant, first detected in India, as one of the most infectious respiratory viruses known so far.
As per the CDC’s latest model, the U.S. may see the new cases range somewhere between 90,000 and 800,000 in the next three weeks.
The CDC says hospital admissions of Covid patients have increased by 32 percent over the previous week.
Meanwhile, the Biden Administration faces the challenge of achieving higher vaccination rates, which, according to the CDC, soared to April at more than 3 million shots per day but have declined to around 530,000 a day.
U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said at a White House briefing last week that 97% of hospital admissions and 99.5% of Covid deaths are occurring among those who are not yet vaccinated,
The NBC channel reported Monday that Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, Florida, and Nevada had the highest daily average of new COVID-19 cases per capita over the past week.
The report notes that these states also have vaccination rates below the nationwide rates.
President Joe Biden, who set a 4th of July goal to vaccinate at least 70% of the adult population in the country, has branded the uptick in new cases as “a pandemic of the unvaccinated.”
New data shows that the Delta variant causes the infected people to have up to 1,000 times more viruses in their nasal passages than those infected with the original coronavirus strain.
“The delta variant is more aggressive and much more transmissible than previously circulating strains,” CDC Director Walensky says.
“It is one of the most infectious respiratory viruses we know of, and that I have seen in my 20-year career,” Walensky added.
Meanwhile, the Biden Administration has decided to persist with the ban on travel to the United States amid the Delta strain upsurge.
“Given where we are today … with the Delta variant, we will maintain existing travel restrictions at this point,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Monday.
