Officials tallies of Covid infections and the real numbers are probably very different.
Dr. Peter Hotez with the Baylor College of Medicine says the numbers are all over the map, but most scientists think the current official tallies are about a quarter to a fifth of the real number.
"If you are looking at two point five million cases, we're probably closer to maybe ten million cases. So we're looking at roughly a third of the state may have already been infected." And that leaves 20 million Texans who could still get the virus.
Hotez notes official tallies of cases, nationwide and in Texas, have been dropping. He says that's no reason to celebrate as new, more contagious and perhaps deadlier variants gain a foothold. "I'm calling that the eye of the hurricane, and even though things are looking a little better right now, the backside is coming and I'm extremely worried."
"We've seen such horrific levels of death and destruction, in South Texas and West Texas and the Panhandle. I worry about our Texas triangle cities very much."
He stresses that everyone who can get vaccinated should do so as soon as possible.
"It seems it gives higher levels of neutralizing antibody if you get the two doses, that's as high as someone having a severe illness. People who have a low-grade infection or are asymptomatic don't make nearly as high a level of neutralizing antibody on average. Some do, some don't. Even if you've been infected you still want to get vaccinated. We're going to wind up vaccinating a lot of people who have been previously infected, especially the asymptomatic ones who don't even realize it, and that's ok. I think we'll get a pretty good boosting effect because of the vaccine."
