New York - The Key to NYC Pass mandate started on Monday, which requires diners to show proof of at least one vaccination dose against the raging coronavirus in order to eat indoors in the most populous US city.
New York City leads the way among large US cities by announcing that public indoor venues, such as restaurants, bars, gyms and performance and entertainment facilities, would require proof of vaccination. Full enforcement won't kick in until September 13. San Francisco and New Orleans have since followed suit.
"The move comes as the Delta variant continues to spread throughout the country, and the battered hospitality industry figures out a way to recover from a year of shutdowns and countless regulatory changes," reported the catering website ny.eater.com.
As for New York State, incoming governor Kathy Hochul said on Sunday she's not ruling out the possibility of mandating a statewide vaccine for indoor activities amid a surge in Covid-19 cases brought about by the Delta variant.
"I'm open to all options," she told CNN's State of the Union. "I'll be looking at the possibility of mandates, but not saying they're in or out until I know all the facts." She also clarified her support of mask mandates for children in school as a necessary safety step for helping New York get through a new wave of Covid-19 infections.
DIRE SITUATION
A lagging vaccination campaign and the spread of the highly contagious Delta variant are driving a surge in Covid-19 hospitalizations in the United States, reported The New York Times on Monday.
The trend is particularly notable among children and younger adults. From Aug. 5 to 11, 263 children were admitted to hospitals every day on average, compared to 217 in early January, the last peak. Average daily admissions rose to a record among 18- to 49-year-olds, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
"We're seeing a lot of people get seriously ill," Anthony Fauci, the U.S. administration's lead adviser on the pandemic, said on CBS' "Face the Nation" on Sunday. "The hospitalizations are on the brink of actually overrunning the hospitals, particularly intensive care units."
Meanwhile, the country has administered 356 433 665 doses of Covid-19 vaccines nationwide as of Sunday morning and distributed 415 957 645 doses, said the CDC, adding that 198 088 722 people have received at least one dose while 168 362 058 people are fully vaccinated as of Saturday.
FIGHT OVER MASK
The Texas Supreme Court on Sunday temporarily halted lower court rulings that allowed local government entities and school districts to implement mask mandates in defiance of an order from Governor Greg Abbott.
Sunday's ruling affects Dallas and Bexar counties, which had both reinstated some form of mask mandate in recent days. In Dallas County, a judge ruled last week that masks would be required inside schools and businesses. In Bexar County, where San Antonio is located, a lower court ruled on Friday that local leaders had the authority to mandate masks in schools.
Despite the Supreme Court's ruling, the Dallas Independent School District (ISD) announced Sunday night that masks will still be required while on district property. Dallas ISD also said visitors will not be allowed inside schools.
In Florida, the chairwoman of the Broward County School Board said on Sunday that the district had no choice but to defy Governor Ron DeSantis's ban on mask mandates.
"We're living out the nightmare of the Covid-19 pandemic, where so many people in our county, including members of our staff and others, are being impacted," said Rosalind Osgood, who heads the school board, on the CBS program "Face the Nation."
Florida's cases are soaring. The state reported a seven-day rolling average of 21,706 new daily cases on Saturday amid the worst surge of the pandemic in this nation.
VACCINATION COMPLACENCY
With the outlook of the Covid-19 pandemic growing worse as hospitalizations and cases surge among the unvaccinated, US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said on Sunday that many of those who have followed precautions may soon grow complacent due to fatigue.
"I do think that many of those who did make that right decision to get vaccinated, are thinking, 'Gosh, I did the right thing but here we are, still in the middle of this pandemic 18 months later,'" Murthy told CNN. "We get through this pandemic when a critical majority of us get vaccinated, and we haven't hit that critical number yet."
As of Sunday, 50.7 percent of the total US population was fully vaccinated, according to data from the CDC, and with just under half of the country still unvaccinated, cases and hospitalizations are on the rise again.
Cases are surging in 40 states, according to data from the Johns Hopkins University. Soon, the United States could be reporting more than 200 000 new cases a day, Director of the National Institutes of Health Francis Collins predicted on Sunday.