Less than a third of Americans are still worried about COVID-19, according to Gallup poll

Americans are starting to worry less and less about the COVID-19 pandemic, even as cases are starting to rise again in parts of the country and White House officials have warned the country could face months of a tough fall and winter.

A Gallup poll released Wednesday found that only 31 percent of Americans said they were “quite worried” or “very worried” about contracting COVID-19, a three percent drop from the survey’s version in February. Within this group, 17 percent of Americans said they were still “very worried” about Covid, down 5 percent.

The survey points to the changing state of the virus as America approaches summer. In previous years, warmer months were accompanied by massive waves of devastating viruses. But this year, the successful introduction of the COVID-19 vaccine and booster, combined with the milder nature of the Omicron variant and its sub-strains, has made people feel much more comfortable with the virus.

However, with the return of spring to summer, cases and deaths are increasing in America. The country is recording 79,609 cases per day, a 30% increase over the past week, and 526 deaths per day, a 38% increase.

The survey was conducted in mid-April, when the downward trend in cases, which had existed for about three months after Omicron’s winter peak in mid-January, began to reverse.

Participants were asked what their feelings were about the pandemic, the virus, and the personal restraint strategies they used or ignored in their daily lives.

The study also revealed that 64% of Americans believe the pandemic is getting better. During the investigation, cases dropped to just under 30,000 a day, making it one of its lowest levels since the pandemic began in March 2020.

About 21% of Americans said they believed the situation was more or less the same, and only 12% believed it was getting worse. These few Americans last believed the situation had deteriorated in the summer of 2021, when cases hit rock bottom just before the Delta variant exploded.

These good feelings also led to some behavioral changes. Only 17% of Americans reported maintaining social distancing, the lowest point of the pandemic to date. Just under a third of Americans said they avoid large crowds, a fifth said they avoid public places, and only 15% said they avoid small gatherings.

These numbers are also pandemic lows, according to Gallup reports.

Despite changes in social distancing, Americans seem to be wrapping up in masks. The survey revealed that half of Americans still wear face masks in public. Although the 50% figure for the pandemic is also low, it is still significantly higher than the number of people who say they are worried about the virus.

The shift in sentiment about Covid is a positive sign for the future, but it also comes with authorities warning that more pandemic threats are emerging around the world.

The prevalence of the new strain of Covid BA 2.12.1, the most contagious version of the virus ranked by US health officials, continues to rise, officials said.

The strain, first discovered in New York last month, accounts for 42.6 percent of the listed Covid cases in the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported on Tuesday. This is an increase from the 33% of cases the tribe had accumulated a week ago.

This newly discovered version of the virus is a descendant of the “hidden” BA.2 variant, which remains the dominant strain accounting for 56% of cases. The new strain is believed to have a growth advantage of about 27% over the previous one and will likely become the dominant strain in the country by the end of the month.

Every single Covid case listed by the CDC falls under the umbrella of the Omicron variant, and the Delta variant has now been completely deleted from its successor.

The BA.1 strain of the virus, which caused a record number of worldwide epidemics during the winter months, now accounts for only 0.6 percent of cases in the United States, as the sub-variant has almost completely outgrown it.

Although it took some time for BA 2.12.1 strains to adopt the invisible variant as the dominant species throughout the country, the CDC reports, it already accounts for two out of three cases in the New York and New Jersey region of the United States.

It is the only region of the country where the species is dominant. It’s also part of the country where authorities first discovered this new strain in the United States.

The new strains account for about half of cases, 48 ​​percent, in the Mid-Atlantic region of Virginia, Delaware, Maryland, and Pennsylvania, according to the CDC.

It also accounts for more than 40% of cases in New England and the southern regions of the Americas.

Like previous strains, this version of the virus appears to have spread across the country from east to west, while its incidence is decreasing in the westernmost parts of the country.

In the Midwest, the variant accounts for about one in three cases, as in the western Great Plains states. BA 2.12.1 accounts for less than one in four cases in both the Southwest and West Pacific and only 13% of cases in the Pacific Northwest.

The Midwestern Plains is an outlier, with the variant accounting for 46 percent of cases in states like Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, and Missouri.

Even the newest versions of Omicron may be making their way to America.

There are growing concerns about the BA.4 and BA.5 strains of the virus currently gaining ground in South Africa and triggering another wave in the country. The country also became the first to be affected by the original Omicron release in late November.

Last month, the World Health Organization announced that it is officially monitoring two strains of the virus as potential concerns.

A previously published study from South Africa also found that the two variants may have the ability to evade immunity against the virus caused by a previous infection.

This could be of great concern to officials, as the massive spread of Omicron that has immunized most Americans against the virus during the winter months will no longer protect humans in the future, opening the door to another new big wave.

With these new threats, the White House worries that America will face a dark fall and winter in the second half of 2022.

A senior Biden administration official said: “The CNN White House currently estimates there will be around 100 million virus infections in the coming fall and winter, a time of year when new cases are detected in both years of the pandemic.

By comparison, around 40 million cases of Covid-19 were reported in the United States between September 1 and February 28, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. While this is probably a serious understatement due to the highly contagious yet mild nature of the Omicron variant, it does mean the White House believes the number of cases could rise even higher this year than last year.