No cases confirmed in Arizona of COVID-19 variant from UK yet

‘It probably will be here soon,’ health official says

Arizona has confirmed no cases of what appears to be a highly contagious strain of new coronavirus that was first detected in the United Kingdom, but some experts say it could already be here.

“I would expect that the UK variant is probably here. If it’s not here, it probably will be here soon, given that it’s already been identified in the United States,” said Dr. Marjorie Bessel, chief clinical officer for Banner Health, which is Arizona’s largest health care delivery system.

Bessel emphasized that it’s common for viruses to mutate over time during a pandemic. SARS-CoV-2 mutates regularly, acquiring about one new mutation in its genome every two weeks, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says.

The British variant is known as B.1.1.7, or B117, and 52 cases in the U.S. had been identified by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as of Friday, including cases in the neighboring states of California and Colorado. The breakdown: 26 cases in California; 22 in Florida; two in Colorado; one in Georgia; and one in New York State, CDC data shows.

CDC officials said the cases identified are based on a sampling of SARS-CoV-2-positive specimens and therefore do not represent the total number of B117 cases that may be circulating in the U.S. SARS-CoV-2, or the new coronavirus, causes COVID-19 illness.

“We should right now assume that it’s here,” said Dr. Joshua LaBaer, director of Arizona State University’s Biodesign Institute and leader of the university’s COVID-19 research efforts.

“We know that it’s been confirmed in at least five places in the U.S. ... The people it’s been identified in, most of them have not themselves traveled, which means that they got it from someone else in the country that may have traveled.”

Here are five things we know about B117:

The UK strain appears to be more contagious but not more severe than other coronavirus variants

At this time, there is no evidence that the UK variant causes more severe illness or increased risk of death than other new coronavirus strains, the CDC says.

A study released last month by British researchers at the Center for Mathematical Modeling of Infectious Diseases at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine found that the UK variant is 56% more contagious than preexisting variants of SARS-CoV-2. The study has not yet gone through the peer-review process that self-regulates scientific journal articles.

The increase in transmissibility of the UK variant “is likely to lead to a large increase in incidence” of disease, the researchers wrote.

ASU has seen some local samples that could be B117, but further DNA sequencing is needed

COVID-19 test results using saliva show a unique pattern in people who have the UK strain of new coronavirus, LaBaer said.

“We test for three genes and in this particular strain, one of those three genes would fail to amplify. So if we see this pattern where two genes amplify and one gene fails, that is potentially the UK strain,” he said.

“We have observed several of those, so we are now in the process of confirming those to see if they are B117. ... We don’t know yet. We need to do the DNA sequencing to confirm it.”

They should know in about a week, LaBaer said.

The Arizona Department of Health Services confirmed Friday that it had not yet identified any UK strain variants in Arizona.

The state implemented sequencing of positive COVI9-19 test samples in late November to identify variants of the virus and has performed sequencing on 133 samples, utilizing the Utah Public Health Laboratory for analysis, ADHS spokeswoman Holly

Poynter email.

ADHS is also providing up to 27 specimens every two weeks to the CDC for sequencing and further characterization, and has been sending positive wrote in an swabs to TGen North for whole genome sequencing since the beginning of the pandemic in Arizona, Poynter wrote.

“We are anticipating getting additional funding that will allow us to ramp up some of those activities with TGen and our university partners so that we can do even more sequencing,” state health director Dr. Cara Christ said during a news briefing Friday.

If UK strain is in Ariz., it does not appear to be predominant

While ASU researchers found several COVID-19 saliva test results that appeared to show a pattern consistent with the UK variant, the strain, “certainly it is not abundant if it is here,” LaBaer said.

Early evidence indicates COVID-19 vaccine works against the UK virus strain

“The big thing to keep our eye on — and so far it’s good news — is vaccine efficacy,” Bessel said of the UK variant. “My understanding is that there are not concerns for vaccine efficacy identified for that strain and for me that’s a really important aspect of that mutation or any other mutations that come our way.”

Prevention protocols for B117 UK variant remain the same

“The way to prevent the spread of that strain as well as every other strain is wear masks, don’t spend time indoors with anybody other than your immediate family, try to do as much outdoors if you do have to be out and don’t go out if you don’t need to go out,” LaBaer said. “For the most part, people should stay in as much as possible. This is not the time to be out and about.”