Medical staff examine a patient suffering from coronavirus in the COVID-19 Intensive Care Unit (ICU) at United Memorial Medical Center on November 16, 2020 in Houston, Texas.
Go Nakamura | Getty Images
Texas public health officials announced Thursday that they have identified the state’s first case of a new, more contagious variant of the coronavirus initially discovered in the United Kingdom.
The patient, a man between the ages of 30 and 40, with no recent travel history, was discovered in Harris County, home of Houston, the county’s health department said in a statement. The man was isolated and in a stable condition, and local infectious disease experts track down all his contacts to find and monitor other people he has exposed to the virus.
It is likely that the variant is already spreading in Texas because the man had no travel history, Dr. John Hellerstedt, the commissioner of the Texas Department of State Health Services, said in a statement. He added that genetic variations in viruses ‘are the norm’, and it is not surprising that the variant was discovered in Texas as the spread is rapid.
“It should all double our commitment to the practice of preventing infections we know: masks when you are with people you do not live with, social distance and personal and environmental hygiene.
Shortly after Texas officials announced their first case, Governor Ned Lamont, Connecticut, said in a tweet that his state had two cases of Covid-19 with the new variant, known as B.1.1.7, in people between the ages. of 15 and 25. Both patients had a travel history outside the state – one to Ireland and the other to New York State, Lamont said.
“As we said last week, given the speed of this new virus strain and its identification in several states across the country, we assumed it was already in our state, and this information confirms the fact,” the governor said in ‘ n tweet.
The strain, which has also been found in California, Georgia, New York, Florida and Colorado, is considered more communicable, but it does not appear that people are getting sicker or increasing the risk of death from Covid-19 said. . Earlier Thursday, health authorities in Pennsylvania said they had identified the first case of their state with the new variant.
Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo, the county’s top-elected official, said in a tweet on Thursday that the discovery of the variant in the area was “disturbing” given the already rapid spread there.
According to the province’s website, the province has remained its highest threat level, ‘level one’, since Thursday, which means that efforts to test and detect contact are tense and outbreaks are ‘present or exacerbated’.
If the province is at this level, residents are advised to leave their homes only for necessary purposes and limit their contact with other people, if possible.
Officials from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the current vaccine should work against the new variant, though more hospitalizations could occur if it was allowed to spread uncontrolled. Federal health officials are also looking for a second separate new strain, first identified in South Africa.
The CDC does not yet know how widespread the new B.1.1.7 variant is in the United States. The agency now requires all airline passengers traveling from the UK to the United States to provide proof of a negative Covid-19 test taken no longer than three days before their departure.
– CNBC’s Will Feuer contributed to this report.