(File Photo: Source for Photo: FILE – A sign asks those getting vaccinated to keep 6 feet apart during the vaccination event, Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2021, at Nevada Union High School in Grass Valley, Calif. The CDC has again revised its COVID guidelines, further relaxing quarantine recommendations and dropping the recommendation that people stay at least 6 feet away from each other. (Elias Funez/The Union via AP, File)
Noah Haswell, Beaver County Radio News
(Beaver County, PA) The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently announced that a new COVID variant called BA.3.2 had emerged in the United States. According to a release from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in its morbidity and mortality weekly report last week, this variant has emerged in Pennsylvania and the following other states:
- California
- Connecticut
- Florida
- Hawaii
- Idaho
- Illinois
- Louisiana
- Maine
- Maryland
- Massachusetts
- Michigan
- Missouri
- New Hampshire
- New Jersey
- Nevada
- New York
- Ohio
- Rhode Island
- South Carolina
- Texas
- Utah
- Vermont
- Virginia
- Wyoming
The CDC confirmed that it was detected in nasal swabs from four travelers, three airplane wastewater samples, clinical samples, and 132 wastewater samples from these 25 states. As of this February, BA.3.2 has been reported in the United States and 22 other countries after it was first detected in South Africa on November 22nd, 2024. A report from the San Francisco Chronicle notes that while it is spreading, it is not the dominant strain, and it doesn’t appear to be surging even though the first positive test came last June from a traveler who went through San Francisco International Airport. The University of Minnesota’s CIDRAP publication expressed that the person who first tested positive for BA.3.2 came from the Netherlands. A report from The Independent states that it is descended from the omicron variant and the current vaccines, which only target JN.1’s subvariants, may not protect against the virus. It also does not appear that BA.3.2 causes a different illness than other mutations.