With at least 22,478 positive COVID-19 cases confirmed on Sunday in New York state, New York City’s health director said that cases are rising quickly but hospitalizations are not. “Right now, there are about a thousand people hospitalized with COVID-19 across New York City. That’s about a quarter of where we were at the peak of last winter’s wave and less than a tenth of where we were in the spring of 2020,” health commissioner Dr. Dave Chokshi said on Monday, blaming the rise in infections on the “Omicron wave.” Chokshi echoed a narrative that has been repeated by federal health officials that unvaccinated people are at risk of developing severe COVID-19 symptoms due to the Omicron variant. “The fact that New York City has built up our vaccination rate—we have over 70 percent of our entire population that’s fully vaccinated—it will help. It’s a sea wall against the Omicron …