Delta Variant Spreads As MD Outpaces Most States In Vaccinations

MARYLAND — The delta variant has become dominant in coronavirus cases across the United States, accounting for more than half of cases nationwide in the week that ended on July 3, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A number of clusters have been reported in states that are lagging on vaccinations, while vaccine numbers in Maryland are well ahead of the national average.

According to the state's COVID-19 vaccination dashboard, 75.3 percent of Marylanders age 18 and older have received one vaccination against the coronavirus.

Gov. Larry Hogan's office recently said all June COVID deaths were unvaccinated residents.

Michael Ricci, communications director for Hogan, tweeted that 100 percent of the state’s coronavirus fatalities in June were among the unvaccinated. He did not list the number of June COVID-19 victims in the state, but data compiled by the New York Times showed 127 Maryland residents died from COVID in June.

Health experts have said that although the risk of getting sick from the delta variant is low for those who have been fully vaccinated, its spread could delay the end of the pandemic.

“Delta will certainly accelerate the pandemic” around the world, F. Perry Wilson, a Yale Medicine epidemiologist, said in a statement.

The delta variant, which was first seen in India and was first detected in the United States in March, spreads 50 percent faster than the alpha variant that originated in Great Britain, which itself spreads 50 percent faster than the original coronavirus strain, according to Yale Medicine.

The amount of delta variant coronavirus cases in Maryland has been so low over a four-week period ending on June 19 that it doesn't register with CDC charts. By comparison, the delta variant accounted for 11.2 percent of coronavirus cases in neighboring Virginia.

Just over half of the national coronavirus cases during a two-week period during that span involved the delta variant, Reuters reported.

Andy Slavitt, a former member of President Joe Biden’s Covid Response Team, told CNN the delta variant is “the 2020 version of COVID-19 on steroids.”

“It’s twice as infectious,” Slavitt said. “Fortunately, unlike 2020, we actually have a tool that stops the delta variant in its tracks: It’s called vaccine.”

That’s evidenced in North Carolina, among other states, where the state’s health secretary said more than 99 percent of the new cases there have occurred in people who are not fully vaccinated, according to WITN.

As of July 8, 24 states were looking at a coronavirus case weekly uptick of 10 percent or more, Johns Hopkins University data shows.

States within regions showing a high cluster of delta variant cases are among those lagging in vaccination rates, WBUR and others have reported. In the region including YOUR PATCH STATE, the delta variant accounted for ##.# percent of recent cases, a map from Fortune.com shows.

In Maryland, ## percent of people age 12 and up — those eligible to get a vaccine — have been fully vaccinated, the CDC said. That compares with the 55.6 percent national vaccine rate as of July 8.