Accessibility links

Breaking News

Hawaii Discourages Visitors Because of COVID-19 Surge


As Hawaii struggles to control COVID-19 as the highly contagious delta variant spreads, Hawaii Gov. David Ige is asking people not to visit the islands and he wants visitors and residents to limit travel to essential purposes.
As Hawaii struggles to control COVID-19 as the highly contagious delta variant spreads, Hawaii Gov. David Ige is asking people not to visit the islands and he wants visitors and residents to limit travel to essential purposes.

Hawaii Governor David Ige is discouraging travel to the Pacific island state, as recent COVID-19 surges have filled hospitals to capacity.

At a news conference in the state capital, Honolulu, Monday, the governor said it was a risky time to come to Hawaii and asked residents and visitors alike to reduce travel to essential business activities only.

Ige said the state’s hospitals are at capacity, and the intensive care units are full. He said state officials are working on surge plans at every facility to expand capacity.

The governor made the comments the same day the city and county of Honolulu announced all events involving more than 10 people indoors and 25 outdoors were canceled, and restaurant capacity is being limited. The governor said he fully supported the actions.

Hawaii has nearly 62% of its population vaccinated, and the governor urged those who have not yet done so to get vaccinated, especially since the announcement Monday that the Food and Drug Administration fully authorized the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine.

The Hawaii Department of Health this week reported the highly contagious delta variant of the virus that causes COVID-19 accounts for 93% of the state’s total infections.

  • 16x9 Image

    VOA News

    The Voice of America provides news and information in more than 40 languages to an estimated weekly audience of over 326 million people. Stories with the VOA News byline are the work of multiple VOA journalists and may contain information from wire service reports.

XS
SM
MD
LG