First U.S. case of virus strain
Young man not known to have traveled is in isolation with variant that’s rattled the U. K.
Colorado man has new variant even though he hasn’t traveled to the U. K. or elsewhere, off icials say.
DENVER — The f irst reported U. S. case of COVID- 19 caused by the coronavirus strain that’s sparked alarm in the United Kingdom has been detected in Colorado, Gov. Jared Polis announced Tuesday.
The variant strain was found in a man in his 20s who is in isolation southeast of Denver and has not traveled recently, state health officials said.
The Colorado State Laboratory confirmed that the man was sickened by the virus variant, and the U. S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was notified.
Public health officials are investigating other potential cases and performing contract tracing to determine the spread of the variant throughout the state.
Scientists in the U. K. believe the new virus variant, which has a distinctive set of 17 genetic alterations, is more contagious than previously identified strains of SARS- CoV- 2, the novel coronavirus behind the COVID- 19 pandemic.
However, many other scientists have pushed back on that view, noting that there are other ways to explain its rapid spread in England.
Any version of a virus can become dominant if it happens to be the f irst to take hold and start spreading in an area, a situation known to geneticists as the “founder effect.”
It’s also possible that superspreader events through dense communities and among people who were less likely to wear masks and socially distance helped it gain a foothold.
So far, there is no indication that the new strain makes people sicker, or that the COVID- 19 vaccines authorized for use in the United States will be less effective against it.
“There is a lot we don’t know about this new COVID- 19 variant, but scientists in the United Kingdom are warning the world that it is significantly more contagious,” Polis said. “The health and safety of Coloradans is our top priority, and we will closely monitor this case, as well as all COVID- 19 indicators, very closely.”
The Democratic governor and state health officials are expected to address Coloradans on Wednesday.
Health officials in California are on the lookout for the variant as well.
The state is testing thousands of samples regularly to identify changes in the virus’ genome, but as of Tuesday, the U. K. version had not been detected, said Dr. Grant Colfax, San Francisco’s public health director.
A memo issued by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health on Christmas Eve asked labs to review recent data from positive coronavirus tests to see if any matched the genetic signature of the U. K. virus.
As of Monday, 29 samples had been examined, and none were matches, said Barbara Ferrer, the county’s public health director.
Even so, Los Angeles County health officials aren’t letting their guard down.
Ferrer said there’s a high probability the variant is in the Los Angeles area, but it doesn’t appear to be dominant.
“Whether the variant is here or isn’t here, the steps we need to take are exactly the same,” she said.
Colfax emphasized that there’s no evidence that existing coronavirus vaccines “will have any trouble working against this variant. The vaccine scientists are testing to confirm this.”
The discovery of the variant led the CDC to issue new rules on Christmas Day for travelers boarding f lights to the U. S. from the U. K., requiring they show proof of a negative coronavirus test.