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As in the U. S. , fitness experts are encouraging Americans, especially at-risk black and brown Americans, to remain vigilant and get vaccinated this fall.
COVID-19 cases are surging in the U. S. The U. S. government is warning the public to be cautious and up to date on their vaccinations.
The threat of COVID-19 was highlighted Monday after the first girl, Jill Biden, who was vaccinated and reinforced twice, tested positive for the virus. White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement that President Joe Biden, who was first with Delaware girl over the holiday weekend, had tested negative and would “test at a steady rate this week and monitor symptoms. “
On Tuesday, Whoopi Goldberg also tested positive for COVID-19, not attending the taping of the season premiere of “The View. “
The presidential spokesman said there were no updates to the White House’s COVID-19 protocols in light of the first lady’s positive screening and stressed, “We have more equipment and systems today for communities this fall and winter. “
One of those devices will be a newly updated COVID-19 vaccine that will hit the market in two to three weeks after approval by the Federal Drug Administration (FDA).
Dr. Anthony Fauci, a former medical adviser to the White House leader, told Grio that “virtually everyone gets” the new vaccine, but “mainly those who are at risk. “
The current prominent professor at Georgetown University School of Medicine said getting the last shot this fall would help mitigate the surge in COVID-19 cases.
Fauci said hospitalizations from the virus have risen as much as 19% in the U. S. U. S. Deaths have also increased, according to the CDC. However, it’s tricky to identify the number of infections because gyms report data weekly rather than daily due to the federal public fitness emergency. which ends in May.
“Once that was over, the follow-up decreased,” Fauci said.
The “encouraging news” is that despite the increase in hospitalizations, they are “very low” compared to a year ago, or even January 2023, the longtime physician and medical researcher said. The United States, as more than 80% of Americans have received at least one vaccine and those who have already been infected.
“It’s unlikely we’re seeing this kind of tsunami of cases, hospitalizations and deaths that we’ve seen,” Fauci told Grio.
While infections aren’t expected to reach the levels of last fall’s outbreaks, that doesn’t mean black and brown communities aren’t vulnerable to COVID-19.
Dr. Melissa Clarke, executive director of BHE Group and co-founder of the Black Coalition Against COVID-19, told Grio: “Although the vaccination gap between blacks and whites has narrowed in terms of outbreaks, blacks are still hospitalized. More than whites.
Clarke insists that, despite the end of the COVID-19 public health emergency, “it’s not over. “He added: “We will have to be vigilant, especially if we are part of a high-risk group. “
Black Americans are also more vulnerable to long-term COVID-19 symptoms. Dr Clarke said one in 10 people with the virus contracts a long COVID “regardless of the severity of the infection”.
There are also systemic inequalities, such as a lack of resources in hospitals in communities of color and access to Paxlovid, the COVID-19 therapeutic drug, to which patients are entitled within five days of a positive test. Eligibility includes having an underlying medical condition or being 65 years of age or older.
“Studies have shown that other people of color . . . they still don’t get Paxlovid at the same rate,” Clarke said. “Probably because they don’t have the same thing to see a doctor or go to a clinic. “
Daniel Dawes, fitness policy expert and executive director of the Institute for Global Health Equity at Meharry Medical College, told Grio that the persistent inequalities faced by black and people of color are why it’s “absolutely critical” that public fitness institutions continue to build fitness infrastructure systems. in communities of color. . .
“We want to continue to do studies to perceive interventions that are culturally appropriate for those teams and geographically appropriate for those teams,” Dawes said. “As we have seen, a single technique does not work. “
He continued: “More investment is needed to understand the interventions that have worked. . . or that they didn’t work, and we want to understand why they worked or didn’t work right now. “
In addition to receiving the new fall vaccine, Dr. Fauci said citizens in certain spaces where the CDC recommends wearing a mask may need one, especially those at higher risk.
“If you’re infected, you can have serious consequences,” he said.
As for vaccines, Fauci said a cadence will most likely be needed for the fall and winter seasons.
“There will now be three circulating respiratory illnesses that will accumulate around the fall and winter months, and that’s the flu we’ve known forever, the flu [and] now also COVID and RSV,” the former director of the National Institutes of Health said.
For those concerned about the kind of COVID-19 surge that prompted lockdowns in 2020, Dr Clarke said there is a “long shot”.
“It’s based on the following variant,” he explained. We know that the virus continues to evolve. If, for some reason, there is a variant that escapes the ability of existing drugs to take care of it. . . It may just happen.
However, due to existing public precautions such as medicines, vaccinations and boosters, Clarke said: “At the moment, everything is fine. “
Gerren Keith Gaynor is a White House correspondent and editor of Politics at Grio. It is located in Washington, DC.
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The post What to Know About COVID-19 This Fall Amid a Sharp Surge first appeared on TheGrio.
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