pockets of unvaccinated people in this country? very concerned. what we have here in the united states is two sprait types of pandemics. one, where the vaccinated population, which are largely protected with getting a full does of the covid-19 vaccine. and then you have a separate unvaccinated population that is at risk for infection. so they re essentially playing russian roulette. so either they will get infected with covid-19 naturally and suffer hospitalization and death and long covid. and so it s one of those thing where is we make sure as many people get vaccinated as possible with the delta variability making up over 50% of the cases throughout the united states. yep. so what is the significance of the fact that people under 50 are now making upmost new infections, has the variant changed the nature or the threat from this virus making it more lethal to people? what we know about the delta variant is it s up to three
variability. this is a regional map where the delta variant is everywhere. the numbers keep going up. you mentioned missouri is out here. 81% of the new cases, delta varjt. down in the southern region, 60%. 35% here. it s everywhere when you look at the new cases. the question has been, the white house has this new strategy, go door to door, sending in delta surge teams where the vaccination rate is well behind. how do you break through? well, we need people who the unvaccinated trust to honestly speak out about this. so there are about 150 million unvaccinated americans right now. about half of them are children urn the age of 18. but let s talk about the 75 million adults who are still unvaccinated. they ve made a choice and their choice is a problem. i think right now in the united states if you are choosing not to be vaccinated, not to be vaccinated, you are part of the
variant and spread the variant to other people who have not been vaccinated. i am not concerned there s going to be a major outbreak. in other words, that we re going to have another epidemic nationwide. but i am concerned, lives will be lost. reporter: while the white house is certainly concerned about the delta variability, there s also been pressure from a bipartisan group of lawmakers to lift the mask mandate that s still in place when it comes if you re flying, taking a plane or a bus, that s not due to expire until mid-september. we have lawmakers speaking up, saying why is still in place, when flying or traveling. the cdc says at this point no plans to lift it, we ll see if that pressure builds any further. alicia, back to to you. and happy 4th of july. alicia: happy 4th of july to you as well. mark meredith at the white house. thank you. griff. griff: pope francis is at a hospital in rome today for what