Minnesota IDs More Contagious COVID-19 Variant, Eyes Improvements for Vaccine Rollout

Markus Spiske on Unsplash

(KNSI) – On Saturday, the Minnesota Department of Health announced that it identified five COVID-19 cases that were the B-117 variant. Researchers believe this strain, which first emerged in September 2020 in the United Kingdom, is more contagious than other strains of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

Sara Vetter, assistant director of the MDH Public Health Lab, says the new variant does not appear to be more deadly or cause more serious disease.

“The cases range from ages 15 to 37, and their illness onsets range from December 16th to December 31st,” Vetter said. “None were hospitalized, to our knowledge.”

Vetter said two of those identified cases live together, and two are known to have traveled abroad. One other case did not travel, and the remaining two’s travel history is not yet known to MDH, which is continuing its close contact investigation for these cases. The five cases come from Carver, Hennepin, Dakota and Ramsey counties.

“While it is thought to be more easily spread from one person to another, it has not been found to cause more serious disease,” Vetter said.

With the B-117 variant present in other U.S. states, like California, Vetter said it is not surprising to find that it is in circulation in Minnesota.

“Knowing that it is now here does not change our public health recommendations,” Vetter said.

Those recommendations: stay home as much as possible, wash hands frequently, wear a face mask, disinfect high-touch surfaces and limiting travel.

The good news, Vetter said, is that preliminary studies show that current COVID-19 vaccines provide immunity against the B-117 strain.

Knowing that the COVID-19 virus mutates over time, like influenza and other coronaviruses that cause colds, provides insight into the future of COVID-19 vaccines beyond 2021.

“At this point, we don’t know the duration of protection for the COVID vaccine, and so we will be continuing to monitor that,” state infectious disease director Kris Ehresmann said. “It may be that it’s necessary to receive an annual vaccination because of the duration of protection, or … if in fact we see variation of the virus strains circulating and that impacts the vaccines’ effectiveness.”

It is too early to evaluate the future of COVID-19 vaccines now as the initial doses continue to be rolled out across the world. Per MDH’s latest data, 147,645 vaccines have been administered in Minnesota. One month into the vaccination effort, MDH Commissioner Jan Malcolm said they are looking at ways to speed up the vaccination process.

“We would like to speed up every step of that process that we can,” Malcolm said. “Some of it just isn’t under our control, like the manufacturers’ shipping schedules, but we are working hard with our vaccination to make sure that any parts of the process that are under our control … we are getting more and more efficient at.”

One trend MDH has noticed, Malcolm said, is that most vaccines are administered during the workweek. Accordingly, she said the department may advise healthcare systems to also administer doses on Saturdays and Sundays, too.

“We do expect these [vaccination] numbers to go up steadily from here,” Malcolm said, noting that the last week was the first week since the start of vaccine rollout in Minnesota that was not interrupted by a national holiday or a blizzard.

As more shots go into arms in the coming weeks, Malcolm said there is a possibility that COVID-19 cases could go back up.

“Just as we’ve seen the patterns of this virus around the country, we do expect to see cases go back up in Minnesota, following the year-end holidays and potentially just as a result of the winter wearing on and more indoor time and more gatherings,” Malcolm said. “If this new variant is circulating or becomes a dominant strain, as we now know it is circulating in Minnesota, that also is likely to put upward pressure on the trajectory of our case growth.”