With the pandemic continuing to put people in the hospital and claim lives, Dr. Michael Osterholm says this is what he expected, as a large portion of the nation has yet to get vaccinated.
"First of all, we have to just acknowledge this shouldn't be a surprise," Osterholm said.
Osterholm joined News Talk 830 WCCO's Chad Hartman to discuss the current state of the pandemic and give his blunt opinion on those against the COVID-19 vaccines.
When it comes to why the pandemic has continued to rage on in the country, Osterholm says that there are two factors, the introduction of new highly contagious variants and those who will not get the vaccine.
Osterholm shared that he felt the darkest days of the pandemic were still ahead of us in May because of those who refused to get the vaccine, as surges can still happen, even when a large number of the population is vaccinated.
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"This is the challenge we have, is helping people understand that we are not done with this, and we are not going to be done," Osterholm said. "There are still 65 million Americans in this country who have not been vaccinated, who have been recommended to get vaccinated, and are able to be vaccinated, and they are going to continue to serve as the human wood for this coronavirus forest fire to burn."
At the moment, a surge is happening in the northern part of the U.S., and Osterholm is worried because we have yet to see a second surge in some of the most populated parts of the country, like Los Angeles and New York City.
"Why the coronavirus doesn't burn all wood equally? I don't know," he said. "It's like forest fires themselves. They skip patches and come back.”
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While those areas of the nation are doing well at the moment, Osterholm thinks things could change any day.
"We're gonna see surges in those areas in the days ahead, so mark my words there'll be news stories coming out 'How could this happen?' 'Here's where we're at,'" he said.
He went on to say that surges are easily explainable.
"It's happening for a simple reason, this virus won't give up until it finds you if you have not been vaccinated or have immunity from a previous infection, and we still have a lot of people who are vulnerable to this virus," he said.
Osterholm shared that by looking at other countries around the world that have even higher vaccination rates than the U.S., they will be able to tell what will happen here. He expects those countries to have COVID-19 surges, as there remains a significant group of people unvaccinated.
"It's simple, either get vaccinated, or you are going to get infected eventually," Osterholm said.
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With the Delta variant surges, Osterholm says that the number of people who have been vaccinated will affect how severe the surge is. But with many saying that they should be allowed to live life no matter what as those who want to be vaccinated have received the shot, Osterholm shared that unvaccinated people still impact others beyond COVID-19.
The doctor said that there are people who have died from other diseases or conditions in many parts of the country because hospital beds are full, and they could not get the help they needed.
"If you don't believe that, listen to the intensive care doctors who are telling you that," he said.
For those who are unvaccinated, Osterholm said he "hope[s] you don't have a heart attack this afternoon; I hope you're not in an automobile accident; I hope you don't need urgent surgery for newly diagnosed cancer because good luck."
Osterholm says it's these implications that the unvaccinated are not considering as the main number of hospitalizations remain to be from those who are unvaccinated.
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