The United States detects its first known case of the new variant of coronavirus in Colorado

An emergency health technician visits a covid patient in Yonerks, New York, this Monday.JOHN MOORE / AFP

The governor of Colorado, Jared Polis, reported this Tuesday afternoon what is the first known case in the United States of contagion by the new variant of the coronavirus detected in the United Kingdom.

This is a man in his twenties who is already isolated in Elbert County, located about 80 kilometers from the city of Denver, and who had not traveled anywhere recently, which raises concerns that it is not an exceptional contagion .

The bad news comes at a hard time in the pandemic, when the mass vaccination operation is longer and more complex than expected and the number of hospitalizations reaches 118,000, the worst record on a weekly average since this crisis began.

"Today we have discovered in Colorado the first case of the variant of Covid-19 B.1.1.7, the same one that has been discovered in the United Kingdom," said Polis on his Twitter account.

The first two cases of infection with a new version of SARS-CoV-2 were detected in late September.

This variant had a higher number of mutations than previously known and, therefore, was potentially more harmful.

An official technical report published on Monday by the British Government has concluded that it is not more deadly or cause more serious symptoms, but it does find indications that it is more easily spread.

A few hours before the Colorado case was reported, Dr. Anthony Fauci, a senior epidemiologist at the White House, shared his grim prognosis in an interview on CNN.

“I think we have to assume that it will get worse, you know, we are between 100,000-200,000 infections a day.

There was a period in the worst part of December, when it was above 200,000, which I hope we will not reach again because it makes us stagger: you have cases, you have hospitalizations and, consequently, deaths ”.

Fauci admitted that the current rally is "out of control."

Meanwhile, the vaccination process in a country of 330 million inhabitants is confirmed as a Herculean task.

The authorities expected to be able to vaccinate a total of 20 million people by the end of December, but reports from the Centers for Prevention and Infectious Diseases put the number of doses sent to States at 11.4 million and 2.1 million. individuals who have received the first dose of the vaccine, according to data cited Tuesday by

The Washington Post

.

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