Affected by the "tsunami" of Omicron, Maryland Governor Larry Hogan (Larry Hogan) announced on the 4th local time that the state has entered a 30-day state of emergency, and will use 1,000 National Guards to assist in the fight against the epidemic, and will also take comprehensive measures such as expanding testing points, strengthening medical resources, and strengthening needles for children's vaccination. On the day of Hogan's speech, Maryland set a new record of 3,057 COVID-19 hospitalizations in a single day, an increase of more than 500 percent from two months ago.
Maryland Governor Hogan delivered a speech on the 4th, declaring a 30-day state of emergency for the whole state
According to the Washington Post and the Maryland government website on the 4th, Hogan introduced the severe epidemic situation facing Maryland at the press conference on the same day, declared the state into a 30-day emergency, and warned that the next 4 to 6 weeks will be the "most challenging" stage.
At present, the cumulative number of confirmed covid-19 cases in Maryland exceeds 750,000, and the cumulative number of deaths is close to 12,000. The number of new cases in a single day surged from about 1,300 in early December to about 12,000 in early January. Hogan revealed that Maryland reported 3,057 hospitalized cases on the 4th, an increase of 500% from 7 weeks ago, and a record high. According to the latest forecasts from the health department, the state may have more than 5,000 hospitalizations in a single day, more than 250% higher than the peak of 1,952 cases last year.
Hogan urged people to pay attention to routine epidemic prevention measures such as "social distancing", "wearing masks" and "avoiding crowds", and he also expressed his dissatisfaction with the vaccination work.
"Nearly 75 percent of all-year 2021 cases of Positive for COVID-19 in Maryland were not fully vaccinated. Nearly 84 percent of all COVID-19 patients admitted throughout the year are not fully vaccinated. It is an irrefutable fact that 84 percent of the more than 4,700 Marylanders who died last year were not fully vaccinated. ”
Hogan shouted to the crowd: "To protect yourself, your family, and your fellow Marylanders from the virus and its variants, the most important thing you can do is get vaccinated throughout the process and get booster shots." ”
Maryland's 90-day epidemic data trend (from Johns Hopkins University)
Hogan said he has directed 1,000 Maryland National Guards to assist local health officials in responding to the outbreak, and about 250 of them will be deployed to COVID-19 testing sites, hospitals and specialty care facilities across the state to assist in transporting patients. To alleviate the shortage of health care workers, Hogan authorized the health department to open 20 new COVID-19 testing sites across the state; at the same time, relaxed the employment policy for health care workers, such as allowing unemployed health care workers to work without reinstating their licenses and allowing them to practice outside the scope of the license; authorizing graduated nurses to work in any medical facility. In addition, the Maryland Department of Health will authorize the vaccination of children aged 12 to 15 years.
Not only in Maryland, but also in the United States, under the attack of the Delta and Omicron variants, the number of new crown cases in the United States has recently shown an explosive growth. On the 3rd local time, the number of new confirmed cases in the United States in a single day hit a record high of 1.02 million. In Washington, D.C., and nearby areas, the positive rate of COVID-19 tests has soared, such as 42% in Virginia in the past 7 days, 29% in Washington, D.C., and 23% in Maryland.
The tsunami-like outbreak has also made the U.S. hospital system once again repeatable. The Washington Post mentioned that in New York, the number of COVID-19 hospitalizations has exceeded the state's peak last winter. New Jersey, New York, Ohio and Maryland have some of the highest hospitalization rates in the nation.
According to the statistics of Johns Hopkins University in the United States, as of the morning of January 5, 2022, Beijing time, the cumulative number of confirmed cases of new crown pneumonia in the United States exceeded 56.8 million, and the cumulative number of deaths exceeded 82.9. In the past 24 hours, there have been 834,800 new confirmed cases and 2,039 new deaths in the United States.
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