The delta variant now accounts for half of the COVID-19 cases in many areas of the U.S., President Joe Biden said Tuesday, urging unvaccinated Americans to get the COVID-19 shots as the U.S. faces a dramatic rise in the “hypertransmissible” variant of the coronavirus.
An NBC Today Health report asks experts about the effectiveness of current vaccines against the delta variant.
David Wohl, MD, professor of medicine in the division of infectious diseases, responded. “It’s very hard to translate laboratory data into ‘what’s going to happen if I’m vaccinated and someone sneezes on me and spreads delta all over my face?'”
The NBC Today report suggests looking to places like the United Kingdom, where the delta variant accounts for nearly 100% of current COVID-19 cases.
“The only real difference between us and them is delta,” said Wohl. “I’m really worried that what’s going on in the U.K. is precisely what’s going to happen here.”
Read more from NBC Today.