As COVID-19 infections rise again around the country, the Delta variant is becoming more prominent.
"It is everywhere and the cases are up in every single state," said Dr. Nancy Nielsen, Senior Associate Dean for Health Policy at the University at Buffalo's Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.
Not every COVID-19 case can be attributed to the Delta variant, but Nielsen said its presence is having a major impact.
"Eighty-three percent of the isolates that have been sequenced in the United States are now the Delta variant," she said. "That's up from, I think it was 51% two weeks ago."
Two weeks earlier, Nielsen said, the percentage was below 30%. A recent study tells more about the patients who have been infected by the variant which was first identified in India.
"They also become infectious in about four days compared to six days with the earlier variant. So people are spreading it to others earlier in their disease," said Nielsen, who provided an update Thursday morning on WBFO.
