A research study run by the National Institutes of Health has turned up evidence of possible coronavirus infections in the United States as early as December 2019, weeks before the first documented infection in this country.
The new report, published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases, bolsters earlier studies indicating that the virus entered the country under the radar and may have been spreading in the first two months of 2020, well in advance of warnings to that effect from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
A volunteer in Illinois who gave blood on Jan. 7, 2020 — in a study unrelated to the emergent virus — tested positive for antibodies to SARS-CoV-2, according to the NIH report. It noted that the antibodies typically take 14 days, on average, to develop, and this “suggests the virus may have been present in Illinois as early as December 24, 2019.” Continue reading.