White House Covid task force says Texas, Florida have 40% of all U.S. hospitalizations

WASHINGTON, DC -- The White House Covid-19 task force, including the president's chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci and Centers for Disease Control director Dr. Rochelle Walensky, held a briefing on Thursday.

It came as the CDC predicted that new Covid-19 deaths and hospitalizations will go up over the next four weeks, which falls inline with the surge in coronavirus transmission rates over the last month.

The situation is particularly dire in Florida and Texas, officials indicated.

"In the past week, Florida has had more Covid cases than all 30 states with the lowest case rates combined. And Florida and Texas alone have accounted for nearly 40% of new hospitalizations across the country," Jeff Zients, the White House Covid-19 response coordinator, said at the briefing.

Upwards of 98% of U.S. residents now live in areas with a "High" or "Substantial" risk of community transmission, while a month ago that number was just 19%.

According to Johns Hopkins University, there have been more than 618,000 coronavirus deaths so far in the U.S. The CDC predicts the total will have reached between 630,000 and 662,000 by Sept. 4.

Cases, hospitalizations, and deaths are going up because of the highly infectious delta variant and low vaccination rates in many areas.