LA health official: No COVID-19 patient in a large hospital system has been fully vaccinated

The Los Angeles County Department of Health Services said no patients admitted to its four hospitals and 19 health centers for COVID-19 have been fully vaccinated against the disease.

“To date, we have not had a patient admitted to a [Department of Health Services] hospital that has been fully vaccinated, with the J&J, Pfizer or Moderna vaccine, ”county health services director Christina Ghaly told the supervisory board on Tuesday, CNN reported.

She added: “Every patient we have admitted for COVID is not yet fully vaccinated.”

Ghaly’s comments come as Los Angeles County experiences an increase in COVID-19 cases as the highly contagious delta variant spreads.

There are around 400 people hospitalized with coronavirus across the region, and the disease positivity rate has risen to 3% – a figure last seen in the region in February, according to CNN. Last week, the county reported a 165% increase in coronavirus infections in a single week.

More than 60% of Californians have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

Those who are not vaccinated are at greater risk, Ghaly said.

“It has really been a very difficult year, and I think it is made all the more difficult because we see the suffering that these patients and their families are going through, and it is very preventable at this point,” he said. she declared.

Barbara Ferrer, Los Angeles County Director of Public Health, echoed Ghaly’s sentiment, saying vaccines remain “the most important tool we have to maintain the transmission of COVID-19 and the incubation of low-level variants “.

The news comes as the U.S. Surgeon General Vivek MurthyVivek MurthyMurthy: COVID-19 vaccine development could bring ‘cures and treatments for other diseases closer’ made a personal White House appeal for Americans to get vaccinated and stop spreading misinformation about the coronavirus pandemic.

“It’s painful for me to know that almost all of the deaths we are seeing now from COVID-19 could have been prevented,” Murthy said. “I say this as someone who has lost 10 family members to COVID-19 and who wants the opportunity to get vaccinated every day. “