The White House is dispatching response teams to hot spots across the country where the Delta variant of COVID-19 is spreading.
The teams will be made up of officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Health and Human Services and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Jeff Zients, the White House’s COVID senior adviser, told reporters at a news briefing.
The Biden administration fears that the variant could gain ground because of the country’s faltering vaccination rate and become the nation’s dominant strain.
Members of the teams will encourage vaccinations, increase testing, provide therapeutics and begin contact tracing in those areas.
“To be clear, the federal government stands ready to meet the moment and work with our state partners to respond to the delta variant,” Zients said.
The surge of the variant began in India and has spread to 90 other nations. AFP via Getty Images
Widespread vaccination is “critical” in fighting the Delta variant, the CDC says. Getty Images“As we continue to work with communities across the country to get more shots in arms, we will also be working with governors and state and local health authorities to identify and address the needs on the ground in places with emergency outbreaks,” he said.
Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the CDC, said the surge of the variant that began in India and has now spread to 90 other countries and that has been reported in all 50 states could be especially lethal for the unvaccinated.
“Widespread vaccination remains even more critical, because the virus that we have circulating is in fact more transmissible than the original wild type,” she said.
”It is clear that communities where people remain unvaccinated are communities that remain vulnerable,” Walensky said.
According to the CDC, 54 percent of people in the US have received at least one dose of the vaccine.
The seven-day average of coronavirus cases is up 10 percent compared to last week, Walensky said.
With Post wires
