Experts have warned that geographic differences in vaccination rates could divide the country into 'two Americas' if the Delta variant takes hold in areas with low vaccine coverage.
As of Friday, the Delta variant first identified in India accounted for 10 percent of new U.S. cases, but it is highly contagious, and the CDC expects it to dominate in a matter of weeks.
Strong regional variations in vaccination coverage have emerged after doses were made available to all adults, with liberal states in the Northeast vaccinated at nearly double the rate of conservative strongholds in the Deep South.
'I call it two COVID nations,' Peter Hotez, a vaccine researcher at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, told BuzzFeed News. 'Somehow we have to break this idea that allegiance to conservatism and the Republican Party has to do with not getting vaccinated.'
'I call it two COVID nations,' Dr. Peter Hotez, Dean for the National School of Tropical Medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine
The Delta variant led to havoc in the UK, now accounting for nearly 100 percent of all cases and delaying the end of lockdown restrictions by four weeks.
British data indicate that the Delta variant is between 40 percent and 60 percent more transmissible than the UK Alpha variant, which is now the dominant strain in the U.S.
A troubling study of cases in Scotland published this week also suggests Delta is more deadly, finding that the risk of hospital admission with the Delta variant was roughly doubled compared to people infected with the Alpha variant.
On Friday, President Joe Biden issued a stark warning about the Delta variant as it became clear the country will fall short of his goal of 70 percent vaccination by July 4.
'The best way to protect
