疾病控制和预防中心本周指派了两名联邦“增援小组”成员去密苏里州帮助对抗该州的疫情新冠肺炎(新型冠状病毒肺炎)汹涌澎湃。

密苏里州是感染人数不断上升的州之一，根据卫生和公众服务部的数据，从6月23日到7月7日的过去两周，新病例增加了46%，平均每周1111例，高于两周前的759例。过去五周，感染人数上升了180%。

密苏里州和邻近的阿肯色州现在是全国人均每周病例率最高的州，也就是说每10万居民中有100多例。在同样的两周时间里，新新冠肺炎医院的接诊人数也增长了30%，一线工作人员表示，患者病情恶化的速度越来越快。

疾控中心派往密苏里州的增援小组是一名流行病学家，被部署去做现场基因测序和数据分析，以及一名顾问，他正在与当地官员合作，研究如何解决疫苗犹豫不决的问题。

大卫·利布/美联社档案

2021年6月15日，一个警告新冠肺炎危险的标志仍然在入口通道外...

密苏里州的疫苗接种率落后于全国平均水平。截至上周五，46%的居民至少接种了一剂疫苗，40%的居民已经完全接种了疫苗，根据疾病预防控制中心的数据相比之下，55%的美国人至少打了一针，48%的人完全接种了疫苗。

州卫生官员说，他们希望更多的帮助即将到来。

“我们期待着与他们合作，并了解更多关于三角洲变异体如何影响密苏里州，特别是最初影响密苏里州西南部的信息，”密苏里州卫生部在一份声明中谈到疾控中心时说。“未来几周将增加更多的团队成员，包括远程和亲自参与，以协助数据和研究、疫苗摄取策略和推广。”

内森·派普斯/斯普林菲尔德新闻-今日美国网分类账，文件

密苏里州州长迈克·帕森参观约旦河谷社区卫生中心接种疫苗...

低疫苗接种率对医院产生了深远的影响，尤其是在该州西南部。在斯普林菲尔德的慈善医院，目前住院的病人比大流行期间的任何时候都多。重症监护室中超过88%的患者使用呼吸机，当本周早些时候呼吸机耗尽时，医院不得不从其网络中的其他医院请求额外的机器。

“这绝对是我见过的最糟糕的情况，”医院的护士艾米丽·麦克迈克尔告诉美国广播公司新闻。“这些病人比我们上次看到的要严重得多，也年轻得多，所以看到这些真的很难过。很多人没有接种疫苗。”

不仅仅是仁慈。在欧扎克湖地区的湖区医院，卫生系统为本周的激增做好了准备。

“我们社区的新冠肺炎死亡人数正在激增，”湖泊地区卫生系统首席执行官戴恩·亨利在周四给社区的一封信中写道。根据亨利的说法，在7月的第一周，有6名COVID患者在医院死亡，而6月份全年有6人死亡，5月份只有1名COVID患者死亡。

“在湖区，我们已经达到了极限。我们的医院已经接近饱和，我们每天都看到非常多的急诊科病人，”他写道。“我也非常担心，如果COVID病例像预期的那样激增，我们将面临的决定。我们周围的医院也人满为患。这意味着我们都没有安全阀。”

查理·里德尔/美联社，文件

在密苏里州李氏峰会，乘客登上密苏里河上的美国铁路公司列车。，2021年6月11日。信息管理系统...

几周以来，最高卫生官员一直警告说，未接种疫苗的人感染这种病毒三角洲变种的风险很高，这种病毒最早是在印度发现的，后来已经传播到100多个国家，包括美国所有50个州。这种变种现在在美国占主导地位，比病毒的原始形式更容易传播，根据疾病预防控制中心的数据。

根据疾控中心的数据，在密苏里州，三角洲变异体占测序新病例的73%。

“我们看到了发生在密苏里州西南部和我们三角洲地区的变异体在大部分未接种疫苗的人群中迅速传播的真实影响，”慈善机构传染病专家威廉·西斯特伦克博士在周三的新闻发布会上说。“这种变异对我们的社区造成了非常严重的冲击和影响，并使更年轻、更健康的人倒下。”

范德比尔特大学预防医学和传染病教授威廉·沙夫纳博士指出，接种疫苗的美国人和未接种疫苗的美国人在住院风险方面存在巨大差异。“在这个国家的大部分地区，有大量社区没有接种疫苗，”他说。如果三角洲变种进入其中一个社区，它“有潜力，因为它非常具有传染性，传播并导致感染。”

虽然完全接种疫苗的人可以很好地避免因delta变异体导致的严重疾病和住院，但对于未接种疫苗或部分接种疫苗的人来说，情况并非如此。

沙夫纳说:“一个完全接种了疫苗的人住进医院是非常不寻常的。"事实上，每一次住院都是可以避免的。"

COVID surging in Missouri as delta variant overwhelms hospitals

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention assigned two federal "surge team" members to Missouri this week to help fight the state'sCOVID-19surge.

Missouri is among a growing list of states that have seen rising infections, with new cases increasing 46% over the last two weeks, from June 23 to July 7, with an average of 1,111 per week, up from 759 two weeks prior, according data from the Department of Health and Human Services. Over the past five weeks, infections have risen 180%.

Missouri and neighboring Arkansas now lead the nation with the highest weekly case rates per capita, which translates into more than 100 per 100,000 residents. New COVID-19 hospital admissions also rose 30% over the same two-week span, and front-line workers say patients are becoming sicker more quickly.

The CDC surge team assigned to Missouri is an epidemiologist, deployed to doon-the-ground genetic sequencingand data analysis, and an adviser who's working with local officials on how to address vaccine hesitancy.

Missouri's vaccination rate trails the national average. As of Friday, 46% of residents had received at least one dose, and 40% were fully vaccinated,according to the CDC, compared with 55% of all Americans who've gotten at least one shot and 48% who are fully vaccinated.

State health officials said they hope more help is on the way.

"We are looking forward to collaborating with them and learning more about how the Delta variant is impacting Missouri, specifically southwest Missouri initially," the Missouri health department said of the CDC, in a statement. "More team members will be added in the coming weeks, both remotely and in person, to assist with data and research, vaccine uptake strategies and outreach."

Low vaccination rates are having a profound impact on hospitals, particularly in the southwestern part of the state. At Mercy Hospital in Springfield, more patients are currently hospitalized than at any point during the pandemic. More than 88% of patients in the ICU are on ventilators, and the hospital had to request additional machines from other hospitals in its network when it ran out earlier this week.

"This is the absolute worst that I've ever seen it," Emily McMichael, a nurse at the hospital, told ABC News. "These patients are a lot sicker, and a lot younger, than what we saw the last go around, so it's just really sad to see. And a lot of the population is unvaccinated."

It's not just Mercy. At Lake Regional Hospital, in the Lake of the Ozarks area, the health system prepared for a surge this week.

"We are experiencing a spike in COVID-19 deaths in our community," Dane Henry, CEO of the Lake Regional Health System, wrote in a letter to the community Thursday. According to Henry, six COVID patients died in the hospital during the first week of July, compared with six deaths during all of June and only one COVID death in May.

"At Lake Regional, we are already stretched to the limit. Our hospital is very near capacity, and we are seeing exceptionally high numbers of Emergency Department patients daily," he wrote. "I'm also very worried about the decisions we will face if COVID cases surge, as expected. Hospitals all around us are filling up, too. That means none of us have a safety valve."

Top health officials have been warning for weeks that unvaccinated people have a high risk of contracting the delta variant of the virus, which was first identified in India and has since spread to more than 100 countries, including all 50 U.S. states. The variant is now dominant in the U.S. and is more transmissible than the original form of the virus,according to the CDC.

In Missouri, the delta variant makes up 73% of sequenced new cases, according to the CDC.

"We're seeing the real-world impact of what's happening across southwest Missouri and in our communities of the delta variant spreading rapidly through a largely unvaccinated population," Dr. William Sistrunk, an infectious disease specialist at Mercy, said a Wednesday press conference. "This variant is hitting and impacting our community very hard, and bringing down younger, healthier people."

Dr. William Schaffner, a professor of preventive medicine and infectious diseases at Vanderbilt University, pointed to the deep divide in hospitalization risk between vaccinated and unvaccinated Americans. "There are large swaths of the country where there are substantial numbers of communities that are under-vaccinated," he said. If the delta variant gets into one of those communities it "has the potential, because it is so very contagious, to spread and to cause infection."

While fully vaccinated people are fairly protected from severe disease and hospitalization from the delta variant, that's not true for the unvaccinated or partially vaccinated.

"It's very unusual for a fully vaccinated person to be admitted to the hospital," Schaffner said. "Virtually every one of those hospitalizations could have been prevented."