New Orleans Jazz Fest is canceled amid rise in virus cases.

The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival has been canceled, officials said Sunday, citing the “exponential growth of new Covid cases in New Orleans and the region.”

The festival, normally held in the spring, had been rescheduled for Oct. 8 to 17 in the hope that vaccinations would make the event possible. Ticket holders will receive emails soon outlining refund options.

Reported cases hit a record high this month in Louisiana, with the state reporting an average of 4,600 new cases a day in the past week, according to a New York Times database. Hospitalizations are up 140 percent to a daily average of 2,037, and deaths have risen 193 percent to an average of 30 a day.

Louisiana reinstated indoor mask mandates this month to try to help contain the infections that have been fueled by the state’s low vaccination rate and the highly contagious Delta variant of the virus. Only 37 percent of the state’s population has been fully vaccinated, according to New York Times data.

Many employers have already canceled or delayed return-to-office plans, but Jazz Fest was one of the first major events to be canceled amid a wave of reported cases that Dr. Rochelle P. Walensky, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has called the “pandemic of the unvaccinated.”

On Wednesday, the 2021 Auto Show in New York was also canceled because of the rise in virus cases.