At the start of last month, 70 per cent of Americans believed the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic was over in a Harris poll.
Now, 54 per cent of respondents state: “the worst is still ahead of us.”
The Delta variant of the COVID-19 virus is now out of control in the US. There were over 112,000 confirmed cases in America on Wednesday, 70,000 more than India, which has the second highest number of confirmed cases.
A total of 656 people died on the same day, meaning that a staggering 631,299 people have died since the virus entered the country.
“The Delta variant is ripping through the unvaccinated,” said Mary Mayhew, Florida Hospital Association CEO.
Florida hit a new peak on Tuesday of 11,515 people hospitalised with COVID-19, according to data from the US Department of Health and Human Services.
Hospitals in Jacksonville and Orlando last week crashed through their pandemic peaks, and hospitals in Miami-Dade County are at or approaching record coronavirus hospitalisations this week.
Florida and Texas accounted for one-third of all COVID-19 cases last week, while cases, hospitalisations and deaths are increasing in nearly all states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
There is some good news. Over 70 per cent of Americans have now had at least one dose of vaccine and the rate of jabs is going up due to the spread of the Delta variant.
But the Biden administration is clearly under pressure. The CDC reversed course on its prior guidance and recommended fully vaccinated Americans who live in areas with high COVID-19 infection rates resume wearing face masks indoors. The guidelines cover about two-thirds of the US population, according to a CNBC analysis.
While the Delta variant hits unvaccinated people the hardest, some inoculated people could be carrying higher levels of the virus than previously understood and could transmit it to others, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said, adding that the variant behaves “uniquely differently from past strains of the virus.”
