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npr.org

COVID-19 cases are up across the country, fueled in large part by the highly contagious omicron variant.

Even with a surge in cases and a scramble for more testing, a smaller percentage of infected people are winding up in the hospital with COVID-19 symptoms compared to earlier strains.

Dr. Robert Wachter at the University of California, San Francisco, tells NPR's Michaeleen Doucleff that the lower hospitalization rate is likely due to two things: greater immunity among the public from vaccines and prior coronavirus infection, and that omicron might be slightly less severe than delta ...