Los Angeles County officials and medical experts are reminding residents to wear a mask indoors and get vaccinated if they are not already.
The push comes amid a recent rise in COVID-19 cases, including more than 2,767 new cases and 13 deaths reported on Thursday and 3,058 cases and seven deaths on Friday. Officials added that there has been an 80% increase in cases since last week.
The figure reported Friday is the largest daily increase since February, according to health officials.
The number of people hospitalized, 655, is also up 200 from just a week ago, the public health department said.
Of the recent cases, about 84% are due to the highly contagious delta variant, officials added.
“Every person who doesn’t get vaccinated ends up being a potential host and spreader of this extremely, extremely contagious virus, and this current strain, this delta strain, from what we’re seeing, is just incredibly contagious,” said Dr. Sam Torbati, of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.
“[The delta variant] is more easily spread between people, more than other variants of concern,” added Barbara Ferrer, director of the Los Angeles County Public Health Department.
Those who are vaccinated are less likely to develop a severe form of COVID-19 if they are infected, the experts added.