12/22/21 - Governor Visits Grand Rapids For COVID Update

Governor Whitmer, along with a group of other experts, encourage residents to do their part.

(GRAND RAPIDS) - Governor Gretchen Whitmer held a COVID-19 update Tuesday morning. She was in Grand Rapids at the Hispanic Center of West Michigan.

Her address did not include any new mandates or restrictions.  However there was a reminder and reinforcement from the state that Michiganders need to get vaccinated and boosted when eligible.

Nearly 90% of all people in the hospital or dying from COVID-19 are not vaccinated.

The governor has set a goal to get one million additional Michiganders boosted from now until the end of January. 

“I know that we’re seeing people who are vaccinated and boosted test positive for COVID,” said Gov. Whitmer. “I think the goal is, of course, all of our individual goals not to get in the first place but the goal is to stay at the hospital, the goal is to stay alive and our odds of doing both of those are much improved if we are vaccinated and boosted.”

Much remains unknown about the variant, including whether it causes more or less severe illness than previous strains.  Vaccinations still should offer strong protection against severe illness and death. 

Also on hand yesterday was Dr. Shelley Schmidt, Pulmonary Disease Physician at Spectrum Health. 

“First we see the infections, then we see the hospitalizations usually about two weeks later, then we see the ICU starts to fill up, then you see the mortality is really no way we’re going to know what the true effect of this variant is until all that get a chance to play out, and with this catchy as it is it’s really just not worth us running the risk with it,” said Dr. Schmidt.