The average number of people getting a Covid-19 vaccination each day is at its highest, but officials are still concerned that many Americans are hesitant to get a shot.
National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Francis Collins said Tuesday that faith leaders can help get more people to be confident in the vaccines.
Getting vaccinated is a "love your neighbor opportunity," he said.
More than 72 million people in the United States have gotten at least one dose of one of the three vaccines authorized by the Food and Drug Administration. Each day more than 2.4 million shots are given, a record. And every state has fully vaccinated at least 10% of their adult population, according to the data compiled by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Collins spoke to faith leaders at Washington National Cathedral to help bolster Covid-19 vaccine confidence.
"The vaccines have in many ways for many people been an answer to prayer," Collins said. "They are safe and effective, beyond what we had a right to expect.
"Unfortunately, many who could most benefit, because they are at highest risk of serious and even life-threatening infections, are still holding back."
President Joe Biden on Monday called on local leaders like ministers and priests to talk about the importance of getting vaccinated. He said they were more important to influence skeptical Republicans than former President Donald Trump.
"I discussed it with my team, and they say the thing that has more impact than anything Trump would say to the MAGA folks is what the local doctor, what the local preachers, what the local people in the community say," he told reporters.
Vaccine hesitancy is significantly higher among Republicans, according to CNN polling.
Concerning variant is about to become dominant in the US, experts say
Experts are worried some Americans are letting up too early -- at a critical time when looming dangers are threatening to wipe out the progress the US has made in its battle against Covid-19.
At least a dozen state leaders have eased Covid-19 restrictions this month, often citing improving Covid-19 trends and growing vaccination numbers. At the same time, air travel is hitting pandemic-era records and the first spring break crowds have begun descending on Florida and other sunny regions while cases of a dangerous variant are on the rise.
The Transportation Security Administration said it screened more than 1.2 million people at airports across the US on Monday -- bringing the total number of US air travelers since Thursday to about 6.4 million. That's the highest number of any five-day period of the pandemic.
In Florida, spring breakers have begun packing shores with some Miami Beach officials reporting swelling crowds and precautions going out the window.
It's a combination of all those factors, officials fear, that could lay the groundwork for another spike.
"We have seen footage of people enjoying spring break festivities, maskless," Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said Monday. "This is all in the context of still 50,000 cases per day."
So is another surge inevitable?
"We could go in either direction," emergency physician Dr. Leana Wen told CNN on Monday. "What happens now is really up to us and whether we keep up masking and avoiding indoor gatherings as we should be until the point that we're vaccinated."
New Covid-19 cases reported over the past week in 15 states are at least 10% higher than the seven days prior to that period, according to Johns Hopkins University data. In two of those states -- Minnesota and Michigan -- cases are more than 40% higher than they were a week ago.
Typically, data from at least a couple of weeks is needed to identify a trend, experts say, but as newer and more contagious variants become more prevalent, catching early warning signs may be key to limiting their spread.
Overall in the country, new cases are still trending lower.