As COVID-19 cases continue to rise here in Connecticut, some top health officials are urging the Governor to institute a statewide mask mandate.

Even though Governor Ned Lamont has set many COVID-19 mandates in place since the Omnicron variant, one of the things he hasn't done this time around is impose an indoor mask mandate.

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According to c-hit.org, the Governor just recently signed an executive order allowing local leaders to impose indoor mask mandates in their towns regardless of a person's vaccination status, but one doctor at Yale University says that's not enough.

Dr. Mark D. Siegel is a critical care pulmonologist at Yale New Haven Hospital, and is also a professor of medicine at Yale Medical School, and through an op-ed piece, he's urging the Governor to reinstitute a statewide mask mandate since COVID cases are skyrocketing, and hospitals are starting to fill up again with caseloads of patients. He calls the situation a 'disaster for the state, and a nightmare for front line workers, nurses, and doctors.'

The main worry this doctor has is that without a statewide mask mandate in place, there's a high risk of hospitals reaching their breaking point as people continue to contract and spread the virus.

Since the spring, when COVID cases declined substantially, the state hasn't had a mask mandate in effect, and this one Doctor feels it's necessary to keep the spread down especially since only 75 percent of people in Connecticut are fully vaccinated, and much more haven't received their booster shot yet, leaving them more vulnerable to breakthrough infection.

So the bottom line is that without a statewide mask mandate, which has been scientifically proven to reduce the spread of the virus, the COVID-19 variants will continue to spread and more and more people will be infected, some, especially those not vaccinated, seriously enough to require hospitalization.

Here's a chart from the Connecticut Department Of Public Health with COVID-19 hospitalization stats from the start of the pandemic through Friday, January 7.

From Wuhan to New York City: A Timeline of COVID-19's Spread

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