In this May 12, 2021 file photo, a man arriving at the COVID-19 Vaccination Clinic in Auburn Mall, Auburn, Maine, is holding the door of another man. (AP Photo / Robert F. Bucati)
As the incident falls and the state reopens, the potential final stage of the US campaign to defeat COVID-19 is turning into a slogan, anxious variants gaining greater foothold, lottery tickets and other prizes. Couldn’t convince some Americans to get vaccinated.
“Last mile and last quarter miles always require more effort in the second half,” said Dr. Nirav Shah, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Maine, Wednesday.
Two states, California and New York, celebrated their reopening this week with fireworks and a multi-million dollar draw, but hospitalizations in parts of Missouri surged and cases surged in Texas. , Shows national challenges. I am facing this summer.
One of the major concerns is the highly contagious and potentially more serious delta mutant of the coronavirus that originated in India. Health officials say vaccines are effective against it, but there is concern that it may lead to outbreaks in states with lower immunization rates.
Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said in a call from the governor on Monday that Delta variants increased from 2.7% in all cases in May to 9.7% this month. Washington Governor’s Office.
At the same time, the state has better understood how to convene focus groups to convince them who is refusing vaccination, why, and how vaccination is right. I will.
“This is a race between vaccines given to people and current or future variants,” said Dr. Lee Norman, director of health at Kansas.
The average number of deaths and cases per day has plummeted by more than 90% across the United States since winter. However, the image is non-uniform.
In Texas, the moving average of newly identified infections rose from about 1,000 per day on May 31 to about 2,000 this week.
In Missouri, the number of cases and hospitalizations has increased significantly as tourists who want to go out with a year of cooperation head for popular destinations such as Branson and Lake of the Ozarks. Health officials said more than 200 people were hospitalized for the virus in southwestern Missouri. This is almost double the number at the beginning of May. The number of patients in the intensive care unit in the area has tripled.
Health experts cite two factors that are causing the surge there. It is a more rapidly spreading delta variant and resistance to vaccination among the population.
The United States is not expected to meet President Joe Biden’s goal of giving at least one dose to 70% of adults in the United States by July 4. This number is about 65%.
Kansas and Idaho are among the states that do not expect to reach their goals. In some counties in Idaho, adult vaccination rates are less than 30%, said Elke Shaw-Tulloch, public health manager at the state’s Ministry of Health.
To increase vaccination, some states are working to divide large doses of vaccine into smaller lots and distribute them to clinics. Health officials see primary care physicians as the key to alleviating people’s concerns.
“People want to hear it from their doctors, their care providers, and the people they know and trust,” Norman said.
Big and flashy prizes like the lottery won many headlines and distributed millions of dollars. Bean gift cards were a huge hit in Maine, home of the outdoor wear company LL Bean. But elsewhere, there are skeptics about such programs.
Shaw-Tulloch said some companies in Idaho offered employees financial incentives to get vaccinated, but didn’t get many test takers. Instead, she said, the important thing is to make the vaccine readily available by turning it into a part of a person’s “daily flow.”
The attitude of some people is, “If the vaccine falls from the sky and hits me on my arm, I’ll get it. But it interferes with my busy daily life and makes that effort and gets vaccinated. I have no intention of doing so, “she said.
“That’s why we focus on walk-in clinics and pop-up clinics, where you can easily get vaccines wherever you go.”
Hope has been glimpsed elsewhere in the world as India resumes the Taj Mahal as new infectious diseases diminish. In France, virus cases fell below 4,000 per day, down from 35,000 in the spring. Authorities have relaxed the requirement to wear masks outdoors and said the curfew will end this weekend.
“Since August last year, no such low-level virus spread has been known,” said Prime Minister Jean Castex.
Meanwhile, South Africa has imposed strict restrictions on rallies and the sale of alcoholic beverages as COVID-19 hospitalizations have increased by 59% in the past two weeks, officials said. The new cases there have almost doubled.
According to Johns Hopkins University, the recorded death toll in the United States by COVID-19 reached 600,000 on Tuesday. There are 3.8 million people worldwide, both numbers are considered to be significantly underestimated.
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