Carney urges residents to get COVID-19 vaccine amid surge in cases, hospitalizations
Delaware Gov. John Carney is urging state residents to become fully vaccinated against COVID-19 as the state is currently seeing a surge in cases and hospitalizations.
In his weekly COVID-19 update, the governor said he is having weekly conversations with the state’s two hospital networks, who are currently stressed and over capacity, as cases have risen in recent weeks.
Carney said the state saw a 7-day average of 748.1 new cases last week. He also said there are 390 COVID-19 patients currently in hospitals around the state, and 49 of those patients are critical.
The governor said the surge is not what the state wants to see.
“That is seven times where we want it to be,” Carney said. “Our goal back in the summer was to be under 100. We got below 100 and now we are closing in on 1,000. It is not where we want to be.”
Carney said the state saw a peak of 474 COVID-19 patients hospitalized on Jan. 14 and saw the lowest number of hospitalizations on June 26 when just 14 patients were hospitalized.
“We got healthier, the surge stopped, and as we went into the spring things dropped,” Carney said. “We hit a low of 14 people in hospitals on June 26. Our fall surge as people went back to work, we are getting people vaccinated, but we still have way too many people who are not vaccinated.”
Carney urged people to become fully vaccinated and also get booster shots. He said that 71% of COVID-19 patients in hospitals are “unvaccinated or partially vaccinated” and “more people are in hospitals this year than this time last year.”
To date, the state has administered 1,543,502 total vaccines, and 618,343 residents are fully vaccinated. Of those, 67.3% of people ages 5 and up are fully vaccinated and 72.6% of people ages 12 and over are fully vaccinated. For those age 18 and over, 74.2% are fully vaccinated and 92.5% of people ages 65 and over are fully vaccinated.
“The group that is lagging behind is the young adult group,” Carney said. “Those Delawareans ages 18 to 34, where statewide, you only have 40% fully vaccinated.”
This article was originally posted on Carney urges residents to get COVID-19 vaccine amid surge in cases, hospitalizations
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