Lamont emphasizes free shots don’t require ID
DANBURY — Connecticut’s weekly COVID-19 positivity rate increased to its highest level since April on Friday, as Gov. Ned Lamont and other officials urged residents to get vaccinated to protect against the highly contagious delta variant.
At a Danbury news conference, Lamont said that compared to high infection rates in some areas of the South, due to its high vaccination rate, COVID-19 metrics in Connecticut have been “relatively flat.”
“It doesn’t mean we’re out of the woods,” he said. “… I think the next three weeks are going to be really important: kids coming back, college students back in the classroom, and I think we’ll have a really better idea by the end of September.”
Cases, positivity rate
The state reported 788 new COVID-19 cases Friday out of 22,892 tests administered, for a daily COVID-19 test positivity rate of 3.44%. The seven-day COVID19
positivity rate stands at 3.55%, the highest it has been since early April.
Hospitalizations
Connecticut reported 378 hospitalizations Friday, a decrease of two individuals since Thursday.
Connecticut on Thursday reported 25 COVID-19 deaths over the past week, up from 21 the week prior. The state has now recorded 8,355 coronavirus-linked deaths during the pandemic.
The United States has recorded 634,137 COVID-19 deaths, according to the Coronavirus Resource Center at Johns Hopkins University.
Vaccinations
As of Friday, 73% of all Connecticut residents and 83.7% of those ages 12 or older had received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, while 65.5% of all residents and 75.1% of those ages 12 or older were fully vaccinated.
“Our state is one of the most vaccinated in the country and we’re fighting like hell to stay ahead of this delta variant, but we’re doing OK,” Lamont said outside a Ctown Supermarket in Danbury, the site of a free vaccination clinic, where he urged shoppers to get vaccinated.
Catalina Samper-horak, the CEO of 4-CT, an organization founded last year to reach out to communities severely impacted by COVID-19, said that for undocumented residents of the state, being asked to show identification at a vaccination clinic can serve as a barrier.
“When we go to vaccination clinics, sometimes we’re asked about an ID that is not required, and we need to advocate for ourselves,” she said.
Todd Liu, vice president of accountable care and general counsel at Griffin Hospital, emphasized that anybody in Connecticut can get vaccinated, whether or not they have identification or citizenship.
“Griffin has 35 mobile vaccination teams that we’ve put together … and every one of those mobile clinics that are going around the state vaccinating people do not require ID and we will vaccinate anybody who wants to be vaccinated,” he said.