CDC Director Just Issued This "Dangerous" Warning
With the President's six point plan to target coronavirus involving vaccine mandates, the question becomes more and more urgent: when will a vaccine be available for kids 11 and under? And what can we all do to stay safe? CDC Director Rochelle Walensky appeared on the Today Show to address these questions and more. Read on for five essential pieces of advice that could save your life—and to ensure your health and the health of others, don't miss these Sure Signs You've Already Had COVID.
CDC Director Warned Delta is "Dangerous"
Is Delta more dangerous or just more transmissible among kids? "Dangerous is more transmissible, right?" said Walensky. "If it is more transmissible, we have more kids with disease. We have more kids with symptomatic disease and more kids ending up in the hospital. We haven't seen yet any data to suggest that if you get the Delta variant, it's more severe in a given person. But we are definitely seeing more disease. If this virus has an opportunity to, it'll go …where people are not vaccinated. The best thing we can do for our kids is surround them by people who are vaccinated when they become eligible to be vaccinated."
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CDC Director Said This About Mandates
"Right now I'm really enthusiastic about the six point plan," said Walensky. "The plan is to get more people vaccinated, to keep people out of the hospital, to keep people from dying, to keep our kids in school, to keep our economy up and running. And I would say that the president is really working with these vaccine mandates that mandate investigation for over a hundred million workers to turn the corner right now."
CDC Director Said Here's When Young Children Might Get a Vaccine
"We're waiting for the companies to submit the data to the FDA we're anticipating that will happen in the fall," said Dr. Walensky. "We will look at that data from the FDA, from the CDC, with the urgency that we all feel for getting our kids vaccinated. And we're hoping by the end of the year." What's the holdup? "We want to move quickly," said Walensky. "We anticipate moving quickly, but we also want to have the efficacy data and the safety data that FDA will require so that we know as soon as it is available…the science has gone through the safety and the efficacy to make sure that it is the right thing for kids."
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If You Live Here, You May Be in Danger
"While we're seeing decreased cases in a number of the hotspots we've been following such as Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, and Mississippi, I just want to remind everyone that we're far from out of the woods," says virus expert Dr. Michael Osterholm. "We have to look at what is happening in other states around the country. And as we do, we see right now that that south Eastern block of states—Tennessee, South Carolina, Kentucky, West Virginia and North Carolina—are all seeing increases of anywhere from 10 to 30% over the course of the past two weeks. If we look at cases in other parts of the country, particularly in the far Northwest and north central areas of the country, we see Colorado, Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, North Dakota, all increasing in some cases in substantial numbers. We are happy to report, however, Oregon and Washington seemed to have hit their peak and are leveling off and hopefully about to decrease."
RELATED: Virus Expert Says if You Live Here, There is Danger
How to Stay Safe Out There
Follow the public health fundamentals and help end this pandemic, no matter where you live—get vaccinated ASAP; if you live in an area with low vaccination rates, wear an N95 face mask, don't travel, social distance, avoid large crowds, don't go indoors with people you're not sheltering with (especially in bars), practice good hand hygiene, and to protect your life and the lives of others, don't visit any of these 35 Places You're Most Likely to Catch COVID.
