A new Omicron sub variant may be the reason behind the sudden surge of Covid cases in Delhi, which witnessed over 60 per cent rise in fresh Covid cases on Wednesday at 1,009 cases.
I don t resent it. i think it s safe. you see, you go inside restaurants anyways and bars and stuff, people aren t wearing it when the mandate was there. i m not sure the mandate helps anything anymore. and we re seeing cases pick up in roughly half the country. some of the steepest numbers here in the northeast. but new jersey governor bill murphy was actually surprised philadelphia reinstated its mask mandated and said he would be shocked if new jersey felt the need to do something similar, all driven by subvariant ba.2. we re seeing roughly 2,000 new cases a day. during the peak of the omicron surge, that was over 800,000 cases. officials saying we re in a pretty good place, we re going to watch the numbers closely and react if we see any further surges. again, the covid czar actually pointed out we have fewer people
Omicron s subvariant ba.2 now accounts for nearly 4% of new cases in the u.s. even if the united states is highly vaccinated but other countries remain unvaccinated, that leads to variants that can accumulate, cause us to have surges. reporter: but tonight a turning point for the u.s. where cases are down 65%. several states announcing a plan to end mask mandates. among them california where effective aifd. though counties like los angeles and san say masks will still be required as they are on public transportation state-wide and in schools k-12. given the increase in population immunity, it makes sense. reporter: tonight our nation facing a new stage of the pandemic. masks will still be
Better, but at this point, i feel like we should be doing our best. reporter: dr. anthony fauci is saying that getting rid of the masks is risky, and another concern, the subvariant b.a.2 showing that it may spread faster and cause more severe disease. the good news though is that we are not seeing much b.a.2 in the united states at all. reporter: and the hospitalizations are dropping to a precovid hospitalization level. if we live with it, live with it as safely as we can. cnn, los angeles. hello, again, everyone, and thank you for joining me. i m fredricka whitfield. we are following breaking news and tense moments as the police are crack down on the trucker protests in canada.
Secretary lloyd austin henry mcmaster cites declining case counts among the reasons he will play no part if in punishing members of the south carolina national guard who rev federal vaccine orders a japanese study awaiting new peer review the subvariant ba 2 which now accounts for 4% of new covid cases in the u.s. is more infectious and virulent than the original omicron strain. its authors warn our multiscale investigation suggests that the risks of ba 2 for global health is potentially higher than that of ba 1. so now we believe that vaccines protect people against the pa 2 variant as the original omicron strain. a preprint three doses of exist nrna vaccine offer lasting protection not only against the original wuhan strain for which they were designed but omicron and other variants.