Dr. John Vanchiere, Pediatric Infectious Disease Specialist LSU Health Shreveport
As COVID cases continue to surge across the state and nation, health officials say the highly transmissible delta variant is a driving factor along with low vaccination rates. LSU Health Shreveport Infectious Disease Specialist Dr. John Vanchiere.
“What we’re seeing is increasing hospitalizations now mostly among people who are unvaccinated but we are seeing what is called breakthrough infections, that is people who are vaccinated getting sick with the Delta variant,” Vanchiere said.
The state has gone from an average of a hundred cases a day to over 1,200 daily. Vanchiere said the vaccine is still your best protection against the virus but even fully vaccinated it is possible to catch the highly contagious Delta variant.
“Are you likely to end up very sick, that means hospitalized, no not likely but again it’s possible; the risk is never going to be zero,” Vanchiere said.
While many think the pandemic is coming to an end with eased health restrictions, Vanchiere said we are only at the halfway mark. He says we are beginning to see more cases among those 40 and under as opposed to previous surges among those 60 and older.
Vanchiere said vaccination hesitancy is a major factor for the increase in COVID cases and only one out of three are fully vaccinated.
“And that’s part of the reason this surge is happening, we talked about six months ago. The faster we vaccinated the quicker we can shut down and prevent variants from emerging,” Vanchiere said.
Today the state reported 1,500 new cases along with 504 hospitalizations and 13 fatalities.
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