COVID-19 May Have Arrived in US in December: Study

SARS-CoV-2 antibodies detected in blood donor samples indicate infections could have occurred in the US more than a month before the first confirmed case, but some experts remain skeptical.

Max Kozlov

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Some people may have been infected with the novel coronavirus as early as December 13, more than a month before the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed the first case of the virus, according to a study published online November 30 in Clinical Infectious Diseases, in which researchers analyzed blood samples from American Red Cross donations. The findings provide further evidence that the virus was spreading around the world well before public health officials and researchers thought it had started circulating.

The Red Cross had originally collected the blood samples to test for exposure to mosquito-borne illnesses such as West Nile virus and the study authors used them to test for antibodies against SARS-CoV-2, Susan Stramer, an American Red Cross virologist and a coauthor of the paper, tells The New York Times.

Among the 7,389 samples, 106 had SARS-CoV-2 antibodies, of which 39 were collected ...

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Meet the Author

Max Kozlov
Max is a science journalist from Boston. Though he studied cognitive neuroscience, he now prefers to write about brains rather than research them. Prior to writing for The Scientist as an editorial intern in late 2020 and early 2021, Max worked at the Museum of Science in Boston, where his favorite part of the job was dressing in a giant bee costume and teaching children about honeybees. He was also a AAAS Mass Media Fellow, where he worked as a science reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Read more of his work at www.maxkozlov.com.
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