Half of the US population is now fully vaccinated against Covid-19, the White House said on Friday, as inoculations rise in response to the surging Delta variant of the novel coronavirus, AFP reports.

“50 per cent of Americans (all ages) are now fully vaccinated. Keep going!,” Cyrus Shahpar, White House Covid-19 data director, said in a tweet.

That means more than 165 million people have received either the two-dose Moderna or Pfizer vaccine or the one-and-done Johnson & Johnson shot.

The threshold of half of all adult Americans fully vaccinated was reached in late May.

Shahpar said the seven-day average of newly vaccinated people is up 11pc from last week and up 44pc over the past two weeks.

The United States is the nation hardest hit by the pandemic with 615,000 deaths.