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COVID-19 hospitalizations have climbed to a record high, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.
Data from DHHS shows that 145,982 Americans are hospitalized with COVID-19 as of Tuesday,NPRreports. The number marks a new high in hospitalizations, according to NPR, and breaks a record previously set last January.
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The rise in hospitalizations comes as the U.S. is also seeing the number of new COVID-19 cases continue to grow. The country is averaging over 700,000 new cases per day, NPR reports. On Monday, the U.S. recorded 1.5 million new cases, per CNBC.
The spike in cases and hospitalizations is occurring as theomicron variantcontinues to spread across the country. The variant, which was first identified in the U.S. in December 2020, is highly contagious.
With hospitals rapidly filling up, doctors told NPR they are being pushed to their limits. Critical care physician Dr. Doug White, who works at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, told NPR, “Things are looking grim and substantially worse in many ways than even just a year ago,” adding, “When hospitals are strained, everyone suffers.”
The National Guard has even beencalled into help at hospitals feeling the strain from an overflow of patients.
As the virus spreads throughout the country and hospitals continue to fill up,Dr. Anthony Fauciwarned that most Americans can expect to be exposed to the omicron variant eventually — but the nation’s leading infectious disease expert stressed that vaccination is still the best way to avoid severe disease and hospitalization.
“Omicron, with its extraordinary, unprecedented degree of efficiency of transmissibility, will ultimately find just about everybody,” Fauci said Tuesday, perCNN. “Those who have been vaccinated … and boosted would get exposed. Some, maybe a lot of them, will get infected but will very likely, with some exceptions, do reasonably well in the sense of not having hospitalization and death.”
He explained that unvaccinated Americans are “going to get the brunt of the severe aspect of this.”
Currently, 208 million Americans are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, and 76.4 million have received a booster shot, according to the most recent data from theCDC.
As information about thecoronavirus pandemicrapidly changes, PEOPLE is committed to providing the most recent data in our coverage. Some of the information in this story may have changed after publication. For the latest on COVID-19, readers are encouraged to use online resources from theCDC,WHOandlocal public health departments.PEOPLE has partnered with GoFundMeto raise money for the COVID-19 Relief Fund, a GoFundMe.org fundraiser to support everything from frontline responders to families in need, as well as organizations helping communities. For more information or to donate, clickhere.
source: people.com
