- A new milestone: 75% of American adults
have now gotten at least onedose of the COVID-19 vaccine.
Still, hospitalizationsand deaths remain high,
largely among the unvaccinated
or those without natural immunity.
Football season kicked off
with hundreds of thousandsof screaming fans
packed shoulder to shoulder into stadiums.
Only five college teamsand three professional
reportedly requiring proof of vaccination
or a negative COVID test before entering.
Despite CDC warnings againstunvaccinated people traveling
over the Labor Dayweekend, the TSA screened
3 1/2 million air travelers,back to pre-pandemic levels.
Highways, beaches, andnational parks all packed.
- I'm hoping we're notgonna see a major spike,
but after every single holiday,
we have seen a bump in infections
and hospitalizations and deaths.
- [Lorie] Meanwhile, as childrenreturn to the classrooms,
heated debates over whetherthey should wear masks.
- [Protesters] No more masks!
- [Lorie] Just in the last week,
nearly 252,000 children tested positive.
That's 1/4 of the totalnumber of US cases,
prompting 1,400 schools in 35 states
to revert back to distance learning.
While most hospitalizations and deaths
are among the unvaccinated
or those without natural immunity,
new data shows vaccinesaren't as effective
as they once were,prompting calls for boosters
as early as this month.
- From my own experienceas an immunologist,
I would not at all be surprised
that the adequate fullregimen for vaccination
will likely be three doses.
- [Lorie] And while theDelta variant makes up 99%
of all US cases, there are reports
of a new variant, Mu, in 49 states.
- While we have a concern thatMu could evade the vaccine,
it's not spreading fast enoughto be a real concern yet,
but the jury's still out.
- While cases of the Mu variantare being closely monitored,
health officials have theirhands full with Delta cases.
Today, President Biden willoutline a six-prong strategy
intended to fight thespread of the Delta variant
and increase vaccinations.
Officials say that strategyis likely to include mandates,
testing, and schools alongwith getting the private sector
to do more on the issue.
Pat.
- Lorie, I want to ask you a question.
It's like somebody turned a switch
and suddenly from havingno fans in the stadiums,
the stadiums are just suddenlypacked with people cheering.
The golf courses now,
they didn't used to have any spectators.
Now, there are thousands of 'em.
What happened?
- Right, well, a lot ofpeople are vaccinated, Pat,
and so you look at thosestadiums and you think, "Wow!"
I mean it is outside.
And we have to remember thatif there's a breeze blowing,
that the chances of infectinganother person are very low.
But then, you do haveto factor in the fact
that you're jammed tight in those stadiums
and you're yelling for two hours straight,
if you're doing it right.
But the good thing aboutthose college games
is a lot of those studentsare actually vaccinated.
In fact, 1/4 of colleges and universities
mandate vaccines for the students
and 70% of colleges and universities
have some sort of incentive program
for the kids to get vaccinated.
And so we might assumethat a lot of those fans
are vaccinated, and certainlybeing outside helps.
- Have we hit what'scalled a herd immunity yet?
- Well, it's really difficultto say about herd immunity,
and health experts are saying no,
we haven't hit herd immunitysimply based on the fact
that this COVID, this Delta variant
is so damaging and so deadly.
Right now, we're hoveringaround 150,000 new cases
every day, Pat, and 1,500deaths every single day,
and so that's a huge increasefrom where we were in June.
And now things are sort ofsettling down in the South
where it was so bad, but moving up
to the Great Plainsstates and the Northwest.
So it looks like this Delta variant
and the ravages of it are goingto be with us for a while.
- Well, now these vaccines we've taken,
now they're talking a booster.
Lorie, could you comparethe various vaccines?
You've got Moderna, you've got Pfizer,
and then you've got the J&J.
Which are superior, do you know?
- Well, actually, there'sa Mayo Clinic study
that shows the Moderna vaccine is better
at fighting the Delta variantthan the Pfizer vaccine
and it wasn't compared against J&J,
although that study hasnot been peer reviewed yet.
It looks like what's going to happen
is Pfizer may be recommended by the FDA
to have a booster shotbeginning on September 20th.
Pfizer got all of theirinformation into the FDA
before Moderna.
Moderna apparently hassubmitted their information,
and those booster shots could be coming
about a week later towardsthe end of September.
But Pat, J&J folks, such as yourself,
are sort of left out in the cold
because there reallyhasn't been very much data
as far as how well thosevaccines are performing
and what's going to happenregarding booster shots.
- Well so far with J&J,I am a happy camper.
I mean, I had no results.
I mean, it's just tremendous,
not even a sore place wherethey put the vaccine in.
I hope and pray that that one gets cleared
and they say good things about it.
But let me ask you one thing.
The word was that littlekids didn't get this.
And now, apparently,
a lot of little children are getting sick.
Now what's the story on that?
- The story is one word, Delta.
Delta changed everything.
And so right, the kidsare getting this a lot.
And a lot of schoolsunfortunately are closing
because of the outbreaks.
And we're seeing hospitalizations.
2,500 kids hospitalized, Pat,in just the last week alone.
Overall, 470 children have died from COVID
during this entire pandemic.
So even though those numbers are terrible
regarding hospitalizations and deaths,
severe illness likethat is still very rare,
but we are seeing a lot of cases.
- Thanks, Lorie.
Ladies and gentlemen, I want to tell you,
this disease is horrible.
The effects are deadly.
It does terrible things to your lungs.
It actually can affect your brain.
And it is a lasting problem.
And to sit there and say,
"Well, I'm not gonna take the vaccine,"
I think it's nuts.
I hate the J&J, if it's available to you.
The others, you know, ifModerna's a good one, whatever.
But there are clinicsset up all over the place
and it's usually a freething that you can get.
And absolutely get vaccinated.
You know, when I was a kid,
everybody got a smallpox vaccine.
I mean, that was the standard.
And smallpox was eliminated
because everybody got vaccinated.
And there's nothing sinful about it.
It's not the mark of the beastor any of these other things.
It isn't the some nefarious plot.
And I really, reallyrecommend that you do it
unless your doctor says,"Well, you can't do it
because you've got something else wrong."
