More than 100,000 people are currently hospitalised with Covid-19 in the United States, a level not seen since January 30, according to a media report.
Hospitalisations are the highest across the South, where every state in the region has a higher portion of its population currently hospitalised with Covid-19 than the national level, Xinhua news agency quoted The Washington Post report as saying on Thursday.
More than 17,000 people are hospitalised with Covid-19 in Florida, the highest among all US states, followed by Texas with 14,000, the newspaper said.
At least eight states — Arkansas, Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana, Hawaii, Mississippi, Oregon and Texas – have already surpassed their records for COVID hospitalizations.
Amid a raging debate over mask requirements in schools, current pediatric hospitalisations for the disease have reached 2,100 nationwide, topping 2,000 for the first time since August 2020, it said.
According to the report, new Covid-19 cases were being reported across the country at similar levels since January.
However, even as many hospitals are under strain and report shortages of intensive care unit beds, overall deaths are far lower.
The daily average of deaths at the end of January was 3,100 and about 1,100 as of Wednesday, said the report.
As of Friday, the US continues to be the worst-hit country with the world’s highest number of cases and deaths at 38,374,252 and 633,479, respectively, according to Johns Hopkins University.
Several states seeing surges in COVID-19 cases are dealing with such an influx of sick residents that hospital beds are drying up.
“Due to the fluid nature of this fourth surge, we will continually monitor capacity and pause or resume elective surgeries with an overnight stay as needed,” read a statement from OhioHealth, which operates 12 hospitals across the state.
Three OhioHealth hospitals’ intensive care units were above 90% capacity as of the week of Aug. 13, the most recent date for which capacity data was available from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. One was 99% full, the data shows.