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CHICAGO – The British variant of the coronavirus was discovered in Chicago, health officials said on Friday.
This variant appears to spread more easily than other forms of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19, which has worried health officials. But state and city leaders have stressed that the UK variant does not appear to cause more severe cases of COVID-19, and vaccines appear to be effective in preventing it.
People can protect themselves as they have done throughout the pandemic: by distancing themselves socially, wearing a mask and staying at home, officials said.
The variant was first discovered in the United States two weeks ago, when a person in Colorado became ill with the strain. It has been found in other states – including near Indiana and Minnesota – since then, and officials said they thought it was probably in Illinois, but they didn’t had just not yet appeared in the samples.
“This news is not surprising and does not change our focus around COVID-19. We need to double down on the recommended safety strategies that we know will help stop the spread of this virus, ”said Dr. Allison Arwady, chief of the Chicago Department of Public Health, in a press release. “In order to protect Chicago, please continue to wear a mask, practice social distancing, wash your hands often, do not have outside guests in your home, and get vaccinated when it’s your turn.”
The Chicago variant has been identified at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine, which is studying specimens that test positive for COVID-19, according to the city’s health department.
The person who was confirmed to have the UK strain had traveled to the UK and the Middle East two weeks before being diagnosed.
The city’s health department identifies people who have come into close contact with that person and is[ing] the importance of respecting quarantine and isolation measures, ”according to the city.
The city’s health department is monitoring the strain, as are the state health department and federal centers for disease control and prevention.
Mutations in the virus are not surprising, necessarily bad or even rare, Arwady previously said: Experts expect to see about one mutation every two weeks with SARS-CoV-2. Hospitals in Chicago and around the world routinely perform genetic sequencing of strains of SARS-CoV-2 found in patients to look for mutations and share the results in a public database, Arwady said.
Since already approved vaccines are expected to work against the variant and spread in the same way as other forms of the virus, city officials are not changing the way they respond to the pandemic just yet, Arwady said. .
But the variant quickly spread to the UK, forcing the country back into a lockdown.
Block Club Chicago’s coronavirus coverage is free to all readers. Block Club is an independent, 501 (c) (3) newsroom run by journalists.
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