going back to louisiana's biggest hospital, for a second.y of the lakes children's hospital had 11 children hospitalized with covid, yesterday. six of them, in the icu. that is made all the more concerning for louisiana and the nation by the new revelations from an internal-cdc document "the washington post" was first to report on last night. which shows that the delta variant appears to cause more severe illness than earlier variant -- variants. and spreads as easily as chickenpox. maybe, most importantly, the cdc presentation said that although vaccines make vaccinated people eight-times less likely to get the delta variant, if a vaccinated person does get a breakthrough case of the delta variant, they can spread it, as easily as an unvaccinated person. to echo louisiana's governor, the delta variant has been an absolute-game changer. no one is seeing the impact of that more, firsthand, than the doctors and nurses in louisiana right now. joining us, now, is dr. mark, he is the emergency room medical director for our -- our lady of the lake

i recently visited louisiana and met with liberal leadership in southwest louisiana impacted by the storms. we've recently opened up a recovery center providing not just assistance to the current storm experienced recently but to help them navigate previous storms as well. >> yes, ma'am and i asked your commitment and assistance to accomplish two things. first, louisiana delegation has been pushing for supplemental disaster funding for some time now, many. i respect leak asked the upper five at request to president biden again, i asked assistance helping local government in my district, fully understand disaster mitigation grant process and other resources available to them. thank you for being here today, i have several questions i'll submit in writing and i look forward to working with you. thank you and i yield. >> thank you. the chair recognizes the gentleman from rhode island. >> thank you, mr. chairman and good morning, administrator. how to thank you for being here today and integrated equity. a first priority. before, during and after disasters, people with disability's and older a

impact of that more than the doctors and nurses in louisiana right now.apierre us, he is an emergency room doctor for our lady in the lake hospital in baton rouge, louisiana. doctor, thank you for joining us. after a day that i am sure was a long day for you and your call colleagues. of the people that you are treating, are they usually unvaccinated, are any of them vaccinated, are you seeing breakthrough cases? >> thanks for having me. we're seeing breakthrough cases but 80% of the patients that are being hospitalized right now are unvaccinated. and as you all said before, it's a younger group, 50% of these are under 50. a third of our patients are in icu. these last two weeks have been a nightmare. they have been way worse than the two weeks combined of the original part of the pandemic, this delta variant is spinning us out of control. >> obviously you know this and your colleagues know this, and state officials know, this is the public registering this? are they saying, wow, something is very different. when you say you've got more people hospitalized

tonight, hospitals in louisiana are filling up, and dr.rine o'neal is fed up. >> are we about to be a community on fire? i think we already are. >> reporter: louisiana has just reported more than 5,000 covid infections. that is the worst since the winter surge. hospitalizations have more than tripled. >> i can't believe we admitted a whole floor of patients last night. >> reporter: just 36% of louisiana's residents are fully vaccinated. and now, vaccine hesitancy is meeting covid reality. did you get to a point when you were scared? >> i'm still scared. >> reporter: p.j. perry says he and most of his family had refused to get the covid vaccine. where have you gotten most of your news from, regarding the vaccine? >> saw it on facebook, and you know, people saying stuff. >> reporter: now, this 48-year- old father says as soon as he leaves this hospital, he is getting vaccinated. >> i don't care if anybody is mad at me, they say "i don't want to take it." i don't care anymore. i don't want to feel like this. >> reporter: across this country,

louisiana ranks 41st for the highest in the nation. and let's not forget that clean energy sources are now generally cheaper than fossil foils. -- fossil fuels. solar power is 20% to 50% cheaper than projected just the year before. solar is now the cheapest in history. every once in a while, we hear, california is dead. and we know it is only a matter of time before the prognosticators are proven wrong again. so my standing invite to my friend mr. graves is to visit california any time and meet with our policy leaders. ask them tough questions. bring your fossil fuel industry talking point. whatever you want to do. let's have a good discussion rather than reciting tired of talking points. this past year we found california is above any other state when it comes to creating jobs and growing our economy. we added more than 1.3 million -- 1.3 million jobs last year. no state is perfect. we have a lot to do. problems to be solved. let's stay in the realm of facts. i will turned out to ucla, dr. park, i want to ask about grid unreliability.

we take you to one of the hot spots, the least-vaccinated state, louisiana. >>> and thousands take to the street in countries around the world to protest tighter coronavirus restrictions. >>> competition for olympic medals isn't the only thing heating up right now in tokyo. so is the weather. olympic athletes are now competing in grueling heat and humidity. there's a tropical storm on the horizon. china leads right now with the four gold medals, followed by japan with three. the u.s. has the most medals overall with seven, including one gold. on saturday, skateboarding and surfing made their olympic debuts. but some of the athletes say they miss the excitement and energy of live spectators. covid remains a serious concern. at least 137 cases are now linked to the games. top american golfer bryson dechambeau won't be competing after he tested positive just before he was due to leave for tokyo. a top draw this sunday is japanese tennis star naomi osaka, who lit the olympic cauldron. she played and easily won her first olympic singles match after bowing out of the french open earlier thi

louisiana is among the least-vaccinated states in the u.s. probably, no coincidence then. cnn's suzanne malveaux reports. >> reporter: it is a dire situation in the state of louisiana. as it leads in the number of new-covid cases per capita. more than any, other state in the country, at this time. there are pop-up vaccination sites trying to address this crisis situation. but if you just take a look at the numbers, alone. 208% increase in number of covid cases over the last couple of weeks. 80% -- more than 80% -- coming from the delta variant. 40% of those in -- louisiana residents -- receiving one -- at least one out of two doses of the vaccine. that is much too low, according to the governor, who says that louisiana has a long way to go. despite the fact that there are some-1,400 vaccination sites, throughout the state, where folks can get it for free. there is, still, a sense of urgency here. take a look at these numbers. it is extreme here. of those people who are testing positive for covid, 92%, not fully vaccinated. of those hospitalized, 90%, not fully vaccinated.

louisiana one of the hardest hit states.ee months, 94% of all new cases are among people not fully vaccinated. i want you to listen to what one louisiana man, hospitalized with covid, is saying about getting the vaccine. >> before you got sick, if you would have had a chance to get the vaccine and prevent this, would you have taken the vaccine? >> nope. >> so you would have gone through this? >> i would have gone through this, yes, sir. don't shove it down my throat. that's what's local, state, federally administration is trying to do is shove it down your throat. >> what are they shoving, the science? >> no. they're shoving the fact that that's their agenda. their agenda is to get you vaccinated. >> yeah, to save -- the agenda is to get you vaccinated to save more people from dying. joining me now is katherine o'neill, the chief medical officer at our lady of the lake regional medical center in baton rouge. thank you so much. i'm very familiar with our lady of the lake. my nieces were born there and whatever. we know it and

hopefully, there's someone from louisiana here that are there any louisiana's way in the back. all right, that's close to the bar. okay. yeah well done. no problem there. my roommate in college was jack daniels, so i'm with you. so we had to deal with dixie and the south and if you think about the civil war you can understand the tensions with dixie and the battle hymn of the republic right now your thoughts on dixie are pretty interesting. well, you know, i like john said i grew up in the south and in the deep south of louisiana and i grew up literally in the middle of cotton field tomorrow. my first memory is being in a house that used to be a heyborn that was in the middle of a cotton field i grew up driving cotton pickers and working in cotton fields and moving irrigation systems and cotton fields and from an early time. dixie was a part of our culture and a part of what i heard growing up and still to this day when i hear the song dixie is still stir something in my soul, even though in my head. i realized that it was a song that was written for a different purpose than wh

joining us now is the state medical director and officer for louisiana.isiana saying 99% of the patients coming to the emergency department with covid, 99% run vaccinated. that squares with what we're seeing across the country. governor john well edwards has bing many so proactive at the beginning. why hadn't. our challenges are similar to our neighbors in arkansas and mississippi. we we get, and there's a lot of. i was happy to see the secretary-general put the -- sometimes it's based on nothing at all but these myths have become so pervasive and do so much damage. last week we had a 24-year-old e.r. nurse from lafayette die from covid. we had a 30-year-old clergy member from the town of eunice do i and those families are suffering and at the end of the day prefer very ventable. that's the real kick in the gut. >> those two you are saying, i'm sure you're saying they were not vaccinated is the point you were making? >> yeah. i can't talk about their cases more than that, but 97% to 99% of both the cases and the deaths that eve seen. breakthrough cases do

louisiana is a very unique historical state. so many things happened in louisiana ahead of the wave of other -- of racial discrimination cases and lawsuits throughout the country. i happen to be involved in a family that led a lot of the civil rights activities from the 1920s until the 1960s and '70s with my dad and my mom and many other southern blacks and whites and people from the caribbean as well who came from haiti after the haitian revolution, the french, the spanish and all of the europeans that came to the south to build all the wealth and the power and the segregation and the plantations that needed to be eliminated from our culture. this program today is a milestone. i think we're in another -- of sorts, another reconstruction period that usually follows a period of extreme need after a war or very bad political thrust for people like me and my friends. so i think that where do we go from here? i think that there are lots of things that we can do at this point and i think that continuing what we have done so far is al

louisiana ranks 41st for the highest in the nation. and let's not forget that clean clean energy sources are generally cheaper than fossil fuels. back in 2020 there was announces the found solar power is 20% to 50% cheaper that it had projected just the year before. the analysis goes on to say this. solar is now the cheapest electricity source in history. i'll repeat that. solar is now the cheapest electricity source in history. bottom line is that every few years we hear about the predicted death of california. i've been involved in california public affairs and politics for my entire adult life in every once in a while we hear california is dead. every few years when we hear that we know that's only a matter of time before those nasty caters are proven completely wrong once again. so my standing invite to my friend mr. graves, exist to visit our great state of california anytime company with our policy leaders, ask them tough questions. bring your fossil fuel industry talking points. whatever you want to do let's actually have a good

suzanne, how concerned are louisiana officials right now? it sounds like this is really getting out of control down there. >> reporter: jim, we're in crisis mode at this point. the governor, governor edwards, saying this is a perfect storm, the confluence of many different factors, including a storm of course that could have been prevented if more had been vaccinated prior to this. but, jim, we are at this pop-up vaccination site here at the oakwood center. folks seem to be taking it very seriously. people are changing their minds, they're educating themselves, and the health care professionals say that they put some of this on themselves, the messaging itself. just take a look at the sheer numbers. this really paints the picture here. as you had mentioned, louisiana is number one now for the number of new cases per capita of covid. just the last couple of weeks, 208% increase in those numbers. one of the things that is happening too as you take a look at it, it is 80% of the delta variant that is making the difference here, and one of the b

the 14 year-old from louisiana is a basketball star. three world records for ball handling skills. she's even appeared alongside steph curry in a commercial. >> around the world will see they can do anything and everything they put their minds to. she's only been spelling since she was 12. in preparation for the spelling bee, she says she tries to do about 13,000 words a day. which usually adds up to zemsev hours. but manages to find time for basketball and school. i guess. >> if she does win she'll be making history. the first ever black american winner of the spelling bee. which airs tonight. at 8:00 p.m. on espn 2. >> love >>> right now on "america this morning," tropical storm elsa slams georgia hitting a u.s. naval base. >> debris everywhere, trailers knocked over. >> the damage this morning from a reported tornado and where the storm is headed next. >>> breaking overnight, arrests in the assassination of haiti's president as we learn more about how the killing was carried out in the middle of the night. the slain leader's wife now

despite the charges, 60% of louisiana's voted for trump, who is taking the infrastructure negotiating lead, ohio's rob fortin, cassidy represented by portman, mitt romney, susan collins, all of them. rob portman is the one negotiating away republican hands to the democrats, dinesh desousa, you think of louisiana, you think of senator kennedy who is so strong and solid and then cassidy elected in 2020, why are these republicans giving away the store with this infrastructure, giving biden his cover? >> republicans have a different psychology than democrats. republicans are literally trying to keep the biden ship afloat, the responsibility to prevent it from tipping over. there are no democrat to behave like this, the only democrat who even plays footsie with the other side is joe manchin, he is in a very conservative state which trump won decisively so there are political reasons for manchin to play to the center but cassidy is in a safety, louisiana, romney in utah. a lot of these never trump republicans were trying to make peace with the democrats, there is no political reason to do i

and louisiana had passed a law and the law of louisiana passed was equal but separate. or equal and separate. it got changed by the court to be separate but equal. it is interesting to think about the context of this case and the 14th amendment and the 13th amendment. the united states had come off the civil war which still remains the largest war in u.s. history. more people died. in war than any war since. the country was really going through radical changes. lincoln had been killed. and we had what was called a second beginning. a second beginning of the united states. so the tleens and 14th and 15th amendment weren't created in a vacuum. it was in response. plessy was not the worst case but one of the worst. but it was responding to one of the worst and that's dread scott. dread scott, jeef justice tanner said, blacks otherwise had no whites that whites had to protect. or recognize. and they can never be part of the global community. this is 1856. so already there's a very strong statement that blacks are separate and apart. at least socially. then the civil war and

. >>> meanwhile louisiana's spike in new cases is rising to levels not seen since the winter surge. the state now has the nation's highest rate of new infections per capita and making matters worse, it's among the least vaccinated states in the u.s. cnn's suzanne malveaux has the latest from louisiana. >> reporter: it is a dire situation in the state of louisiana as it leads in the number of new covid cases per capita, more than any other state in the country at this time. there are pop-up vaccination sites trying to address this crisis situation, but if you just take a look at the numbers alone, 208% increase in number of covid cases over the last couple of weeks. 80%, more than 80% coming from the delta variant. 40% of those in louisiana residents receiving at least one out of two doses of the vaccine, that is much too low, according to the governor who says that louisiana has a long way to go, despite the fact that there are some 1,400 vaccination sites throughout the state, where folks can get it for free. there is still a sense of urgency here. take a look at these numbers, it

a quote and a chilling warning from a doctor in louisiana, voice raising the alarm about what is now again a growing number of covid cases across the united states. the number of cases is now rising in all 50 states. look at that map of new cases compared to the prior week. you can see, right, if you're green or, you know, yellow, you know, you're sort of steady or improving. orange you're bad. red is terrible. and you see that dark red blanketing all most the entire country and it's not just cases that are up. hospitalizations are now also on the rise. one state surging is florida. the white house's covid response coordinator jeffrey saying one in five covid cases in the united states are in florida. you can see the spike there from a month ago. tonight, the state's governor ron desantis is taking a different tax selling campaign merchandise hocmocking dr. fauc selling hats and shirts that say don't fauci my florida. telling cruise lines they cannot mandate passengers show proof of vaccination status. by the way, the companies don't like that. norwegian is suing florida because they

one of those being played like fiddle is louisiana senator bil cassidy. cassidy is one of the few republican senators to vote to convict donald trump and his second impeachment trial. despite the absurd charges and the fact that nearly 60 percent of louisiana and voted for trum and who is taking the infrastructure negotiating? it's ohio's rob portman, so cassidy represented by all of them, now rob portman is going to be the one negotiating away republicans hand to the democrat . joining me now is the host of the podcast. you think of louisiana, you think of senator senator kenned who is so strong and solid, and give got this guy cassidy, who was just elected in 2020 at disaster, why are these republicans just giving away th store over this infrastructure and giving biden a cover? >> it's because republicans hav a completely different psychology then democrats, republicans are literally tryin to keep the biden ship afloat. they feel it's they're responsibility to prevent it from kind of tipping over. there are no democrats to reall behave like this the onl

miguel marquez is in lafayette, louisiana.oth of these states have less than half of residents fully vaccinated. louisiana just 36%, florida 47%. >> reporter: where we are right now jackson health system, they said that over the weekend they saw double the amount of covid-19 patients coming in over what they saw earlier in the month. many of those who were coming in were unvaccinated and also they're noticing a surge in a younger patient. we're talking about the age bracket of 30 and 40. so you look at the dynamic at play here. we talked to one epidemiologist who said you have the cases doubling, you have the number of positive results going up and then you see that the number of vaccinations is steadily declining. i spoke to an infectious disease expert who said that not only is she concerned about the unvaccinated population and the younger population, she's taking a look at where we are and she believes that not only the u.s. but also florida jumped the gun. >> we jumped the gun because people who were unvaccinated were fol

louisiana isn't far behind and nearly every hospital there has canceled or postponed surgeries and other nonemergency care. the state is also seeing an alarming spike in cases amongen cbs's david begnaud reports tonight from new orleans. >> reporter: when you think about the the covid vaccine protecting the vulnerable think about 5-year-old dominick albert. are you hav >> yes. >> reporter: he's too jung to be vaccinated. he contracted coronavirus and that landed him in the emergency room. >> where do you think he may have gotten it? >> honestly, i don't know. i was taking every precautions to try to make sure that he does not get this. >> reporter: school age kids now make up the third largest number of new covid infections in louisiana. what's the lesson here? >> to make sure to wear a mask, number one, at all times. >> reporter: disney is now mandating that masks be worn indoors at all u.s. theme parks. some cities and states have brought back mask mandates, too. >> people over the age of two must wear a mask indoors regardless of their vaccination status. >> reporter: but there are ho

and louisiana had passed the law and the law of louisiana pass was equal but separate. or equal nine separate it got changed the phrase that phraseology came by the court that came known as separate but equal. and it's actually also interested to think about the context that this case and the 14th amendment and the 13th amendment was actually the baby within the case. the united states have come off the civil war which still remains the largest war in us history more people died in that war than any war since the country was really going through radical changes. um lincoln had been killed. and we have what eric quano called a second beginning a second beginning of the united states. and so the 13 14 and 15th amendment was reaching to actually create something quite different. it wasn't creating it in a vacuum. it was creating it in a sense and response to what had happened and if plus is not the worst case is one of the worst but it's in part responding also to another case that maybe be the worst and that's dread sky. i'm in red sky just chief justice. tammy famously s

louisiana is a bit luckier. because of our position as an energy powerhouse, the gas prices here at home are still averaging about $2.75, not going down any time soon. now, while the administration is actively trying to kill domestic energy jobs, they're working to increase production of oil overseas. again, asking the opec cartel to increase production so there's more oil to lower gas prices. why don't we just produce more oil in the united states of america? the administration says that they are killing jobs in the u.s. because of carbon emissions, but when you produce oil and gas in the gulf of mexico, you bring it to our shores, it has the lowest emissions profile of any oil and gas that we use in our country. you almost have to ask, what is it about the u.s. oil and gas worker that the administration doesn't like? in 2019, just speaking about louisiana, in 2019, oil and gas operations supported nearly 250,000 louisiana jobs. about one out of every nine jobs in my state. the oil and gas industry provided $73

i recently visited louisiana and met with political leadership southwest louisiana impacted by those storms. we've recently opened up a recovery center dividing not just assistance to the current storm experienced in recent expert also to help navigate the process for the bigger storms as well. >> yes, ma'am and i ask for your commitment in the interest of time, i'd like to ask for your commitment to accomplish two things. first, louisianars delegation fr supplemental disaster funding, i respectfully ask you amplify that request to president biden and again i ask for assistance for local government and i understand disaster mitigation grant process and other resources available thank you for being here today, i have several question submit in writing and i look forward to working with you, thank you and i yelled. >> the chair recognizes the gentleman from rhode island for five minutes. >> good morning. thank you for being here today and equity, i want this to be first priority. before, during and after disaster, people of disability's as wellst as older adults, manyf which of those o

i recently visited louisiana and met with political leadership in southwest louisiana that were impacted by those storms. we have recently opened up a recovery center that's providing not just assistance to the current storm that was experienced in recent weeks but also to help them navigate the process for the previous storms, as well. and so you have -- >> i -- yes, ma'am. i ask for your commitment there. in the interest of time, in closing, i'd like to ask for your commitment and assistance to accomplish two things. first, louisiana delegation has been pushing for supplemental disaster funding for some time now, many months. i respectfully ask you amplify that request to president biden. second, again, i ask for your assistance with helping local governments in my district fully understand the pre-disaster mitigation grant process and other resources that are available to them. i thank you, ma'am, for being here today. i have several questions that i'll submit in writing. i very much look forward to working with you. thank you, mr. chair. i yield. >> thank you very much. chair recogni

let's begin in louisiana, one of the least vaccinated states in the nation. cnn's suzanne malveaux is in gretna. suzanne, what actions are being taken there amid a spike in infections? >> reporter: pam, i talked to a lot of people in jefferson parish at the mall. they express a lot of fear. fear over the vaccination, fear over the delta variant. and then also a lot of misinformation that people have. so there's lots of questions and health officials trying to

but fred, it is a dire situation in louisiana. louisiana has the dubious distinction now of really having the highest covid increase rate over the last couple of weeks per capita. so the governor making emergency announcement saying this is a crisis situation in his state, confluence of many different factors. just look at the numbers alone, fred, talking increase of 208%, covid cases in the last two weeks. 80% of that due to delta variant. 40% of louisiana residents getting at least one dose of a vaccination. the governor saying it is way too low. they've got to do much better and get numbers up higher, much, much faster, otherwise this will be even worse than what was expected. this is what the governor said yesterday. >> this really is the perfect storm. the conditions are ripe for catastrophic outcomes for far too many individuals and families. >> reporter: using that analogy, he is talking about hurricanes that folks here in louisiana are used to, fighting and battling. unlike a hurricane, he says this is something that peopl

other parishes in louisiana are in the 20s.wanted to find out who are some of those getting vaccinated now. with public health experts referring to a movable middle. you have folks on one end that got vaccinations right away, folks on the other end don't want anything to do with it, dead set against it. you might have folks that wanted to see how the vaccines would effect their friends, their family, whether they wanted to research it more. went to a vaccine clinic nearby, spoke to some people getting vaccinated today and i asked them, why didn't they get vaccinated several months ago. >> i think it is the right decision. people need to get out and try to keep safe however they can. have a young grandbaby in the future, want them to be safe, too, good family decision, i think. >> reporter: that was just one man. there was a younger man also in his 30s who said that he was just going to be a father coming up and that played into his decision and yes, he waited several months because he wanted to, quote, do his research. there wa

louisiana senator bill cassidy who is a physician blaine to vaccine hesitancy and democrats. we are going to be partisan. but over here you better trust us. that just doesn't work. senator cassidy encourage people to see medical professionals for accurate information and said he's trying to help share you choose either to be vaccinated or to accept a higher rate of unnecessary death and the information that's found on social media platforms is the topic of contentious debate here in washington last week, president biden blamed social media platforms for allowing the spread of misinformation 2 thirds of the people who. >> i have not gotten vaccinated say because they've got something off a social media. come on. >> senator amy klobuchar defendant president biden's comments. i really appreciate a president biden calling this out. >> and for months now i've been taking on the dirty dozen 12 people responsible for something like 60% of this misinformation the administration says social media companies must do more. facebook is pushing back saying it is promoting accurate informat

that's the shreveport times in louisiana. here's the front page in the news star which is up in monroe in northeast louisiana. hospitals see rise in covid cases. here's the front page today in the daily sun, which is the newspaper of the villages in florida, delta variant fuels rise and hospitalizations. it's right there on their front page. here's the marietta times right in mariata, ohio. i should tell you in ohio it is literally front page news they want people to start backing into parking places on main street instead of going in head first. that's the usual level of like news you can use in the meriata times. look at their banner headline today. covid cases in the u.s. triple over two weeks. up in idaho, idaho leaders urge shots as covid cases rise. in austin, texas, the front page of the austin statesman today, delta variant driving virus spike. east austin lags in vaccine coverage. over in san antonio, texas, the front page of the san antonio express news, says 40 ill in assisted living outbreak. also on the front pag

more than 25 rounds fired at his home in louisiana outside of shreveport. the menden police association saying the sound of gun fire in menden is so common that people are not reporting it. this all changed tonight when a drive-by shooting claimed the life of an innocent small child. well, to the crime crisis unfolding in our nation's capitol. more than 200 officers have left the force since october according to the d.c. police chief. now mayor bowser says the district will hire dozens of officers after being rocked by crime. here now, ted williams and attorney who has represented police. he's also a fox news contributor. ted, great to see you. the d.c. mayor plans to hire 170 police officers. we told you d.c. police chief said they lost 215 since october. they are playing catch-up. how do you get back to even? >> it's interesting to see how they get back to even, trace. i can tell you the mayor has seen the light in recent weeks here. we had a shooting outside of the major metropolitan baseball stadium. a shooting in broad daylight on 14th street in the di

i work at the largest hospital in the state of louisiana. give a ton of data points to the state and to the cdc each and every morning. the problem with tracking data is that it just takes time. i think that we will have these figures, i think they will have them in a couple of weeks. i'm not disturbed by it. we know what's happening in our community. we're talking about it, breakthrough cases happen because we're not vaccinated so right now we probably all need to put our masks on and stem this surge and by the time it can give you a good breakthrough case we will be out of it. >> speaking of putting our masks back on new orleans began enforcing its mask mandate for indoor areas. is that something you think would be helpful to see in other places across louisiana given there are all these conversations about whether or not we need to be doing that even if you are someone who is fully vaccinated? >> we heard our governor say yesterday that he wanted masks to be put back on in state buildings and i do agree. right now, again, there's just so

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nbc's gabe gutierrez is in lafayette, louisiana, gabe, you've seen some extraordinary things over thislt year and a half. you've been out there on the front lines. talk to me about louisiana and about the woman you interviewed from the icu by the telephone. >> reporter: yes, andrea. here in louisiana hospitalizations have doubled over the past few weeks and the hospital we are at right now, our lady of lourdes medical center have seen significant increase and they've gone from 11 covid patients to now 40 covid patients and other parts of louisiana are seeing a bigger increase with baton rouge and this is something we're seeing in different parts of the south. in the covid unit yesterday in jacksonville, florida, at u.n. health and we got to see the dynamics playing out there in that hospital was telling us that they were seeing a 40% increase in the hospital overnight and actually broke their record that they had set in mid-january. andrea, we did speak with a patient inside that hospital and we spoke with her through glass. she was in her hospital bed and she had been there since satu

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louisiana, 37% of its population fully vaccinated.low? this is what happens. in louisiana they call them parrishs. they might be counties where you live. all of louisiana's parrishs reporting high community transmission of covid. then you get a high case count. look at the jump. june 22nd, 285 cases. tuesday, more than 3600 cases, the highest since back in january. we all lived through january. dr. joseph cantor, grateful for your time. why is this happening in your state? this case couldn't has to be st scary to you? >> it is scary. it feels similar to each of our three previous surges here. the slope is very steep. we have a perfect storm going on. we have unacceptably low vaccination coverage. we've had more delta variant circulating in this part of the country than the national average for a good month. we know delta is much more aggressive. what happens down here in the summer time is analogous to what happened in the north in the winter, which is the weather drives people indoors. it's 90 degrees or higher this week. that increa

andrew, jonathan ferro mentioned louisiana is difficult, louisiana cases is back -- are back to februarylifornia is back to march 2. do you as a pro care about the case increase or do you consider hospitalizations and deaths? >> i think both are important, i think it is even more important to emphasize the fact that the vaccines are protecting against severe disease and hospitalization that was really driving such a crisis in our medical community during the peak months of this pandemic. case numbers are important to follow because we want to follow the case numbers in vaccinated people compared to unvaccinated people to figure out what is driving the infection. the most important number is disease severity, and protection from death. case numbers are important because the more this virus replicates, particularly this delta variant the more likely we will see variants emerge from it better at infecting people and getting around immunity. tom: explains the unvaccinated the divinity -- the disease severity of a 32-year-old admitted to the hospital this morning? andrew: early in the pandemi

one out of every six jobs in louisiana is from the mississippi river.to say it's one of our greatest-- probably our greatest natural resource. >> reporter: hathorn has navigated large ships up and down the channel for decades. >> our area is one of the most treacherous pilotage areas in the world-- very congested, with tens of thousands of barges, hundreds of tow boats. we have i think seven bridges in between new orleans and baton rouge to navigate through. it can be very trying on a person. >> reporter: even in normal conditions, navigating the mississippi is so challenging that a specially-trained local pilot must steer every international freighter safely to port. but the unpredictable high water season is making that job tougher. 2019's flooding was record- setting for both its duration and volume. >> we've had twisted anchors, broken anchors, brok chains. ten, 15 years ago, you didn't see that. >> reporter: captain jared ruiz of the east baton rouge sheriff's office deals with the aftermath of broken chains and twisted anchors. >> we'll come out h