U.S. COVID-19 HOSPITALIZATIONS, DEATHS LIKELY TO INCREASE IN NEXT 4 WEEKS: CDC

Thu 12 August 2021:

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the United States released ensemble forecasts on Wednesday indicating that COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths in the country are likely to rise in the coming four weeks.

Coronavirus cases in the US have spiked to the highest levels in six months, according to a tally by the Reuters news agency. New infections have increased more than five-fold over the past month, with the seven-day average hitting 118,000 on Tuesday.

But some states continue to refuse to impose mask mandates or other measures aimed at preventing the virus’s spread.

The ensemble forecasts predict 3,300 to 12,600 new deaths, 550,000 to 2,340,000 new cases likely reported in the week ending Sept. 4.

There will be 9,600 to 33,300 new confirmed COVID-19 hospitalizations likely reported on Sept. 6, according to the ensemble forecasts.

A total of 630,000 to 662,000 COVID-19 deaths will be reported by Sept. 4, said the forecasts.

The previous forecasts, published Aug. 4, predicted up to 642,000 deaths by Aug. 28.

“Over the last several weeks, more reported cases have fallen outside of the forecasted prediction intervals than expected. This suggests that current forecast prediction intervals may not capture the full range of uncertainty. Because of this, case forecasts for the coming weeks should be interpreted with caution,” said the CDC.

The White House said last week that almost 90 percent of US educators and school staff are vaccinated.

The federal government and several US states, along with some hospitals, universities and a growing number of private employers, have said they will require employees to be inoculated.

New York City last week became the first big US city to require proof of COVID-19 vaccination at restaurants, gyms and other businesses, starting next month.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine tracker is showing that almost 167 million Americans are fully vaccinated against COVID, equal to 50.3% of the overall population. That means they have had two shots of the vaccines developed by Pfizer PFE, -3.90% and German partner BioNTech BNTX, -13.76% and Moderna MRNA, -15.64%, or one of Johnson & Johnson’s JNJ, +0.02% one-jab vaccine, the only three to have been granted emergency use authorization by the Food and Drug Administration.

But Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser said this week he expects the FDA to grant at least one vaccine full approval within weeks, clearing the way for it to be mandated by the private sector as well as schools and universities, as the Associated Press reported.

As of Wednesday afternoon, there have been over 36 million COVID-19 cases and 618,457 fatalities in the United States, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.

———————————————————————————————————————-

FOLLOW INDEPENDENT PRESS:

TWITTER (CLICK HERE)
https://twitter.com/IpIndependent