While Louisiana’s COVID-19 numbers are on the downward slide, and Governor John Bel Edwards’ restrictions are easing, nationally COVID-19 is still a serious threat says Dr. Fred Lopez, Professor and Infectious Diseases specialist at LSU Health New Orleans School of Medicine.
“In fact, just the last fourteen days there has been a 19% increase in the number of COVID cases see across the United States,” said Dr. Lopez. “Just two days ago there were 70,000 new cases of COVID-19 in the United States.”
He says the national trend raises a warning sign that as as COVID mitigation measures are eased, it could result in another surge in cases.
Dr. Lopez suspects the rise in case numbers could be a result of a variaety of virus mutations now showing up across the world and here in the United States.
“So, there is a lot of reasons to continue to sound cautious words like Dr. Walensky uttered on Monday because there are a lot of cases still being reported on a daily basis,” said Lopez. “We are certainly better off than we were in January but we have seen this play out before…we relax, the virus gets back on a surge and all of a sudden we see more hospitalizations and deaths.”
Dr. Lopez says the best weapons to fight back any virus surge is to continue to wear a mask and to get vaccinated.
