New Covid-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths are beginning to rise in the US again, one of the country's top health leaders said Monday.

The latest findings, shared by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky, may just be the start of what experts have for weeks warned about: another surge.
A surge that could come just as the country inches closer to a return to normalcy and officials nationwide race to get as many Covid-19 vaccine shots into arms as possible.
So far, about 28.6% of the US population has received at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine and about 15.8% is fully vaccinated, according to CDC data.

"There's still a lot of vulnerable people out there. A lot of people are going to get sick and die unnecessarily when we're so close to the finish line," Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the Brown University School of Public Health, told CNN on Monday night.

Jha's remarks came as the US hit another grim milestone: more than 550,000 Americans have now died of Covid-19, a death toll far higher than any other country's.

Speaking during the White House Covid-19 briefing Monday morning, Walensky said she was "scared" about where the US is heading, and shared her feeling of "impending doom."

"I so badly want to be done. I know you all so badly want to be done," she added. "We are just almost there but not quite yet. And so I'm asking you to just hold on a little longer, to get vaccinated when you can so that all of those people that we all love will still be here when this pandemic ends."