Coronavirus Watch: Is delta making kids sicker?

The delta variant of COVID-19 is clearly more contagious than previous variants, and it's tearing its way across the South, sickening many children in the process. 

At Texas Children's Hospital, there are more patients with COVID-19 right now than at any point in the pandemic. Tennessee is getting close to its all-time high of kids sick with COVID-19. And at Joe DiMaggio Children’s Hospital in Hollywood, Florida, the number of children needing treatment for COVID-19 jumped from 20 in June to 200 in July – and has topped 160 so far in August.

What's not clear is whether kids are getting any sicker with delta than with other variants.

"Right now, it's speculative," said Dr. James Versalovic, interim pediatrician-in-chief at Texas Children's Hospital. Versalovic said the children he's seeing seem to have more fever and congestion than those treated during last summer's and winter's surges. But it's too soon to know whether they will have worse outcomes. Read more here.

It's Thursday, and this is Coronavirus Watch from the USA TODAY Network. Here's more news you need to know.

• More than 25,000 workers at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services must get vaccinated to protect patients at medical or clinical research facilities, the agency announced Thursday.
• In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Wednesday a new requirement that all teachers and school employees — for public and private schools — need to be vaccinated or submit to regular COVID-19 testing, saying it was the "first state in the country" with such a mandate.
• In Mississippi, which is averaging 2,700 new infections a day, the number of patients needing intensive care and ventilators has surpassed the worst of the pandemic during the winter months.
• In New Mexico, Albuquerque hospitals were "totally overfull" as the state enters a new wave, with nursing shortages affecting the entire system and available ICU beds tightening, state officials said.
• In Texas, the University of Texas at San Antonio will hold most classes online for the first 3 weeks of the semester due to a local delta variant surge.

Today's numbers: The U.S. has reported more than 36.2 million COVID-19 cases and 618,600 deaths, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. Worldwide, there have been more than 205 million cases and more than 4.3 million deaths. About 59% of people in the U.S. and 71% of U.S. adults have received at least one vaccine shot, and about 50% are fully vaccinated, according to the CDC.

Tracking the pandemic: See the numbers in your area here. See where cases are rising here. See vaccination rates here. And here, compare vaccinations rates worldwide and see which countries are using which vaccines.

– Grace Hauck, USA TODAY breaking news reporter, @grace_hauck