CDC Director Rochelle Walensky weighed-in this week on the nation’s ongoing struggle to contain the Omicron-variant of Covid-19; saying the strain is “milder” than Delta but not “mild.”
“While cases have dramatically increased and are five times higher than they were during the delta wave, hospitalizations have not increased at the same rate and deaths remain low in comparison to the case counts,” she said during a White House briefing.
“Hospitalizations have rapidly increased in a short amount of time, putting a strain on many local health systems,” Walensky added.
“Importantly, ‘milder’ does not mean ‘mild.’ And, we cannot look past the strain on our health systems and substantial number of deaths – nearing 2,200 a day as a result of the extremely transmissible omicron variant,” she said.
“As Dr. Walensky said, when you have over 2,000 deaths, 150,000 hospitalizations, and you have people who are now getting infected to the tune of somewhere around 700,000 a day, we’re not there yet,” explained Dr. Anthony Fauci.
“We believe we can get there because we have the tools with vaccines, with boosts, with masks, with tests, and with antivirals. That’s what we talk about when we get to the point where we can, quote, ‘live with the virus.’ But, as Dr. Walensky emphasized, that is not where we are at this point. So, we still have a way to go,” he concluded.
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