Delta Variant May Impact RI’s Pandemic Recovery, Vaccination “Cold Zones” May Fuel Spread

Delta Variant May Impact RI’s Pandemic Recovery, Vaccination “Cold Zones” May Fuel Spread

The coronavirus Delta variant —  linked to hundreds of thousands of deaths in India —  is now sweeping through much of the world. Countries like England and Australia are now implementing significant restrictions. 

In Los Angeles, county health officials on Monday strongly urged even those who have been vaccinated to resume masking up indoors as a precaution against the Delta variant.

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In Rhode Island, 69 percent of adults are fully vaccinated, but the worry is that the state’s vaccination "cold spots" create the crevice for the Delta variant to start spreading spread fast.

Nationally, 26% of all coronavirus cases are now estimated to be the Delta variant.

In Rhode Island, coronavirus cases and hospitalizations have fallen dramatically. There were just 15 new cases reported by the Rhode Island Department of Health for Monday and there are 22 people now hospitalized.

Of the nearly 4,000 total test specimens analyzed from Rhode Island, just 9 have tested to be the Delta variant.

“Re-masking is happening around the world out of an abundance of caution particularly when the variant spreads. The British numbers are particularly interesting because it's not just that there are a larger percent of Delta [cases], the British numbers are actually showing another small surge,” said  Dr. Michael Fine, the former RI Director of Health.

 

RI Cold Zones Could Fuel Spread

Fine worries that the densely populated area of the state could be impacted first and that Rhode Island's testing in those communities does not allow for DNA sequencing and, thus detection of the Delta variant.

"I worry a bunch about our testing, that our testing is mostly Binax or the rapid test in the highly-dense communities that are most at risk," said Fine.

The RI Department of Health has identified a number of "cold zones"  -- areas around the state that are under 50% vaccinated. The areas include Woonsocket, portions of Pawtucket, and a number of sections in Providence, including Elmhurst, Washington Park, Silver Lake, Smith Hill, and Elmwood.

"I worry those are the communities -- 'cold zones' - where Delta is going to show up first and I really worry that we won't see it until it has spread more widely because we're not testing with PCR and with DNA," said Fine.

"So we may not know if it's here [significant spread] when it gets here. The 'cold zones' are the communities where our vaccination rate is lowest and where we haven't been able to make much progress in increasing that vaccination rate -- that's exactly where our vulnerabilities are and that's what we got to be worried about," added Fine.

Those who are vaccinated are 79% protected and 96% protected against hospitalization, according to a study in The Lancet.