North Texas is in the midst of a coronavirus resurgence.
Tarrant County posted its highest case counts since March this past weekend.
The numbers had hovered between 400 and 600 new cases per week for the past few months. That number increased to more than 2,000 new coronavirus cases per week in mid-July. According to health officials, people who have contracted COVID-19 in the county since March have largely been unvaccinated.
Tarrant County is also seeing nearly four times the number of hospitalizations related to coronavirus compared to the month before. County Public Health Director Vinny Taneja said there are currently more than 320 people hospitalized due to the virus, compared to close to 90 a month ago.
More and more North Texans are contracting the more transmissible delta variant of coronavirus.
"The more time we give the virus to mutate in people, the more variants are going to come out,鈥� Taneja said. 鈥淲e're going to run out of alphabets to name those variants.鈥�
The delta variant is now the most prevalent strain both in Texas and the country as a whole, .
The CDC says all the coronavirus vaccines available in the U.S of hospitalization, death and transmission associated with COVID-19.
鈥淧eople who get vaccinated, we can pretty much not worry about them right now,鈥� said Taneja. 鈥淲hat we鈥檙e worried about and what we鈥檙e seeing is a pandemic of the unvaccinated.鈥�
Tarrant County Commissioner Roy Brooks said most people who have been hospitalized and died due to coronavirus in the county have been unvaccinated.
鈥淭he key is, take the shot,鈥� Brooks said. 鈥淚t can鈥檛 be plainer than that. You got to take the damn shot.鈥�
With increased coronavirus cases, public health officials recommend wearing a mask and avoiding unnecessary indoor gatherings, in addition to getting vaccinated.
鈥淭here鈥檚 no harm in giving yourself an additional layer of protection,鈥� Taneja said.
Dallas County Director of Health and Human Services Phil Huang said he鈥檚 seeing many of the same issues as Tarrant County: Case numbers and hospitalizations going up due to variants and slowing vaccination rates.
鈥淪ome of our latest estimates is it鈥檚 still close to 60% that aren鈥檛 fully vaccinated in Dallas County,鈥滺uang said. 鈥淲e鈥檙e all looking at this disturbing trend upward, and [along with the hospital systems], we鈥檙e trying to address the different ways of how we get people to get vaccinated.鈥�
Dallas County Health and Human Services reported that about 82% of COVID-19 cases diagnosed during the week of July 10 were people who were .
Huang said he and other health officials are trying to stress the importance of the health outcomes of community vaccinations, rather than politics.
鈥淕etting vaccinated should not be a political thing,鈥� Huang said. 鈥淭his is totally public health. These vaccines work. There鈥檚 hundreds of millions of doses that have been administered. They're safe. They're extremely effective.鈥�
Huang said his concern as a new school year approaches is the potential for spread from children under 12, who could potentially be vaccinated by this winter or early 2022, to unvaccinated parents, which would put a strain on the hospital systems.
Free COVID-19 vaccines are available across the state through .
Got a tip? Email Elena Rivera at erivera@kera.org. You can follow Elena on Twitter .
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