Posted on 08/05/21
| News Source: i24
Medics point to link between states with worst spikes in morbidity and lowest vaccination rates
The United States hit a six-month high for new COVID cases with over 100,000 infections reported on Wednesday, as the delta variant ravages areas where people did not get vaccinated.
The country is reporting over 94,819 cases on a seven-day average, a five-fold increase in less than a month.
Seven US states with the lowest COVID-19 vaccination rates - Florida, Texas, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi - account for half of the country's new cases and hospitalizations in the last week, White House COVID-19 coordinator Jeff Zients told reporters on Thursday.
Florida, the worst-hit state, has over 13,000 patients hospitalized in life-threatening condition, an all-time high.
In the coming weeks, cases could double to 200,000 per day due to the highly contagious Delta variant, said top US infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci on Wednesday.
Also Thursday, Washington announced the US is joining Israel, Germany and France in giving booster shots to elderly and at-risk populations.
Since it began in late 2019 the coronavirus outbreak has killed at least 4.2 million people globally, including over 610,000 people in the US, which is the worst-affected nation.