Growing reluctance among Republicans to get vaccinated for coronavirus is alarming many health experts as the Delta Variant spreads, and confirmed cases in all 50 states rise.

More than 30% of the country remains unvaccinated as the Delta variant takes over as the dominant strain, making up over 50% of all cases in the United States, The Hill reports.

“It is really profoundly sad to note that essentially almost 100 percent of every person who has been admitted to the hospital today with covid could have been prevented,” said William Schaffner, an infectious disease expert at Vanderbilt University.

Experts are saying more than 99 percent of people who are now dying from the virus are unvaccinated.

Republican reluctance is believed to be playing a large role in the lower vaccination rates, especially after a crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference cheered the White House’s failure to reach its goal to vaccinate 70% of Americans by Independence Day.

Republican officials have criticized the Biden administration’s door-to-door vaccine outreach, with Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) tweeting that “an army” was going to “push the experimental vaccine,” whereas Biden pushed back to say that local doctors and faith leaders who were pushing for the shots didn’t represent the federal government.

Not all Republicans have expressed the same opinion, however, with some breaking to tout the vaccines, stressing their importance to help the United States combat the virus once and for all.

Sen. Mitt Romney., Utah broke from his colleagues saying “I think it’s an enormous error to suggest that we shouldn’t be taking vaccines, the politicization of vaccines is an outrage and frankly moronic,” he said.

Mitch McConnell also broke from his GOP counterparts saying “I’m perplexed by the difficulty we have had finishing the job.”

“If you’re a football fan, we’re in the red zone, but we’re not in the end zone yet, and we need to keep preaching that getting the vaccine is important,” McConnell added.

After a Newsmax host suggested the vaccines go “against nature” the network distanced itself from the anchor’s comments saying it “strongly” supports the Biden Administration’s efforts to distribute the vaccine.

White House Press Sec. Jen Psaki said the administration will continue to work with local leaders to push back against misinformation.

“The most important thing we can do is not see this as a partisan issue because certainly the virus is killing people, whether they’re Democrats or Republicans,” she said.

Coronavirus