Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker announced Wednesday that all pre-K through 12th grade schools and day cares must follow universal masking indoors regardless of vaccination status.

Pritzker said the state is facing a growing threat from the delta variant and noted that children under 12 aren't yet eligible for COVID-19 vaccines.

"Far too few school districts have chosen to follow the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention prescription for keeping students and staff safe," he said at a news conference. "Given the CDC’s strong recommendation, I had hoped that a state mask requirement in schools wouldn’t be necessary, but it is."

The latest delta surge is once again pushing hospital staffing to breaking points across the U.S.

In Alaska, Idaho, Oregon and Washington, some "facilities are experiencing substantial shortages of both clinical and support staff," according to a Department of Health and Human Services planning document obtained by ABC News Wednesday.

In hard-hit Missouri, many hospitals "don’t have the staff to support a surge without further modification to operational strategies," the document said.

At a Shreveport, Louisiana, hospital, where the number of COVID-19 patients are multiplying, nurse Melinda Hunt told ABC News, "To be honest, I probably cry most days at work. And I cry at home. I’m tired. I’ve been doing this a year and half. It feels like it’s never going to end."

The U.S. daily case average has climbed to more than 84,000, a 45.3% jump in the last week, according to federal data.

The daily case average is now more than seven times higher than it was six weeks ago.

All but three states are now reporting high (a seven-day new case rate ≥100) or substantial (a seven-day new case rate between 50-99.99) community transmission, according to federal data.

-ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos

The delta variant now accounts for 93% of all sequenced cases in the U.S., according to the latest CDC data, which was collected over the last two weeks of July.

Delta accounted for just 3% of cases sequenced in late May.

Across the Midwest, described as HHS regions 7 and 8, delta made up 97% to 98% of cases. This includes Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Colorado, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah and Wyoming.

-ABC News’ Cheyenne Haslett

In Louisiana, which has the nation's highest case rate per 100,000 residents, COVID-19 hospitalizations are reaching peak levels, with more than 1,700 patients now receiving care.

"We're seeing people that are way too young to be so sick," David Wrightson, a respiratory therapist and ECMO (extracorporeal membrane oxygenation) specialist for the Willis-Knighton Health System in Shreveport, Louisiana, told ABC News. "We see families destroyed. We see children without one or more parent because of this virus. We see a new mom who will never go home to see her newborn, will never see her child grow up."

He went on, "When you see someone that's 30 years old with no medical problems at all, nobody knew anything was wrong, and we have this person literally on death's doorstep, doing everything in our power to turn them around and return them to their family. The vaccine is something worth getting."

More people need to see and understand the reality of this disease, he said.

"I wish I could show them a few steps in our day to see what we see and to see what we have to do, and to go home at night and, and have nightmares about those things, and sometimes cry yourself to sleep," he said.

-ABC News’ Erica Baumgart and Arielle Mitropoulos