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WASHINGTON – The US state of Colorado recorded what is allegedly the first US case of the particularly infectious variant of the coronavirus that emerged recently in Britain, the governor said Tuesday.
“Today we discovered Colorado’s first case of COVID-19 variant B.1.1.7, the same variant discovered in the UK,” State Governor Jared Polis tweeted.
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He attached an official statement from his office and state health officials saying the individual is a “male in his 20s who is currently isolated in Elbert County and has no travel history.”
The individual had no close contacts, according to the statement, but the situation will continue to be monitored “very closely” and authorities are working to identify other potential cases through contact tracing.
The Washington Post reported that the Colorado case is the first known infection of the virus variant to be recorded in the United States. The first two variant cases on the North American continent were discovered in Canada over the weekend.
The new strain of Covid-19 has raised fears, which experts say is potentially more transmissible.
READ: EU prepares vaccine launch as new variant spreads
More than 3,000 cases of the variant have already been reported in the UK and in dozens of countries in Europe and around the world, according to the EU health agency ECDC.
In South Africa, more than 300 cases of another variant have been recorded. Three cases of that strain variant have been confirmed in Europe, two in the UK and one in Finland, but all three have been linked to people returning from South Africa.
