Bethany Bump reports in the Times Union that COVID-19 cases in the past two weeks in the Capital Region grew by nearly five times. Cases have grown to the level they were in late May, when they were falling, bottoming out around July 4. Since then, COVID cases are growing locally. The share of people testing positive for the virus in the region rose from 0.3 percent to 1.7 percent during the past two weeks. "After over a year of containing the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, we are now being told that COVID is now mainly a pandemic among the unvaccinated," Gov. Andrew Cuomo said July 19. "If you haven't already, I encourage you to get your shot to best protect yourself and your loved ones against the variants spreading through the nation.” Albany County Executive Dan McCoy says that more than 99 percent of new COVID-19 cases being tracked by the New York State Association of County Health Officials are from people who are not vaccinated. “If you haven’t gotten the shot, you aren’t protected from the virus, and the delta variant makes the situation even more serious,” he said. “There are opportunities every day to get a free vaccination here in Albany County and throughout the Capital Region.” The new variant of COVID-19 is much more contagious, but the vaccine works very well against any COVID-19 variant. COVID cases across the country were up 70 percent over the past week. Albany County currently leads the area with 61.5 percent of its population fully vaccinated. Columbia County is at 56.6 percent fully vaccinated; Rensselaer County has 55.6 percent vaccinated and Greene County has 48.7 percent of its population fully vaccinated. Read more about this story in the Times Union.