More evidence suggests COVID-19 was in US by Christmas 2019

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

NEW YORK (AP) — A new analysis of blood samples from 24,000 Americans taken early last year is the latest and largest study to suggest that the new coronavirus popped up in the U.S. in December 2019 — weeks before cases were first recognized by health officials.

The analysis is not definitive, and some experts remain skeptical, but federal health officials are increasingly accepting a timeline in which small numbers of COVID-19 infections may have occurred in the U.S. before the world ever became aware of a dangerous new virus erupting in China.

“The studies are pretty consistent,” said Natalie Thornburg of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“There was probably very rare and sporadic cases here earlier than we were aware of. But it was not widespread and didn't become widespread until late February," said Thornburg, principal investigator of the CDC's respiratory virus immunology team.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/more-evidence-suggests-covid-19-was-in-us-by-christmas-2019/ar-AAL4fVa

[Wingus Dingus]

1. Illogical to believe it arrived here all at once, when we were already aware of it,

and only started spreading while we watched. Covid doesn't kill or even seriously sicken most people, so of course it was circulating undetected for weeks to months before we knew about it. Probably some deaths from it that were attributed to other types of pneumonia too.

[ok_cpu]

2. Not surprising. I already believed it anecdotally

I had a coworker who, along with his wife, had a couple days of a flu-like illness in early January 2020 that hung around for weeks as what he described as being super tired with some difficulty breathing. By late afternoon, you could really see him dragging.

[LonePirate]

3. If it had been circulating for weeks/months, I wonder what caused the explosion in cases in Feb/Mar.

Did a slowly increasing number of cases reach a widespread threshold or was there some other event or environment situation that led to the rapid case growth?

Could there have been a variant that emerged in Jan/Feb/Mar that significantly increased transmissibility or death?