The number of Covid-19 patients at Huntington Hospital has doubled in recent days, Dr. Nick Fitterman, executive director, said Monday, increasing from 5 to 10.
He said that nine of the 10 current Covid-19 patients were not vaccinated against the disease.
“There’s a growing voice that says, ‘If I can get it, why get the vaccine?’,” Fitterman said. “The answer is that if you get Covid and you’re vaccinated, it still protects you from the most severe form of the disease. You’re unlikely to arrive in the hospital and you won’t arrive in the morgue.”
Across the Northwell system, he said, the number of Covid patients had tripled in two weeks.
Fitterman cited the spread of the Delta variant of the virus, which has swept across the country, for the increase in infections, especially among the unvaccinated.
“The Delta variant is a worry,” he said, “much more contagious. Over 90 percent of admissions from Covid could be prevented. And more than 97 percent of deaths are of the non-vaccinated.”
“We have not reached herd immunity,” Fitterman said, which he says experts believe would be well above 70 percent. “we need to protect immune compromised.”
And, he said, “We are still battling the misinformation pandemic, which is doing great harm.”