The state says more than half of all fully vaccinated residents have received a COVID-19 booster shot.
Governor Janet Mills said Thursday that 50.2% of fully vaccinated Mainers have gotten their booster shot. Only Vermont, Minnesota and Wisconsin rank higher when it comes to booster vaccination rates.
The news comes as further spread of the Omicron variant results in high numbers of cases and hospitalizations in the state. On Thursday, the Maine CDC reported more than 1,300 new cases and 3 deaths, with 412 COVID-19 patients in hospitals statewide. That represents a drop from the all-time high of 436 set last Thursday.
Although hospitalizations remain high, the rate of patients needing critical care or ventilators has fallen in recent weeks.
With cases surging, Maine CDC Director Dr. Nirav Shah said Wednesday they had a backlog of 46,000 positive test results that still needed to be processed. Because of that, he says daily case counts have become less useful in getting an accurate picture of the virus’s spread. Another reason is that many Mainers are taking at-home tests, which are not reported to the state.
In his Wednesday briefing, Shah also said the state will expand wastewater testing to twenty sites throughout the state. Officials say wastewater testing is a way to detect COVID-19 at the community level, and can indicate ahead of time which areas may soon see a rise in infections.
He said those sites are coming online in the coming weeks and that the data collected will be made publicly available.
