“The person with the Omicron variant is an adult male, is a resident of Hennepin County, and had been vaccinated,” the department said in a statement.
The individual then sought testing two days later, according to the Department of Health. Officials said the man had traveled to the New York City Anime NYC 2021 convention at the Javits Center between Nov. 19 and Nov. 21.
“We still have more to learn about Omicron, but the most important thing we can do right now is to use the tools we have available to make it as hard as possible for this virus to spread,” Minnesota Health Commissioner Jan Malcolm said in a Dec. 2 statement.
Malcolm added that “we can slow the spread of this variant and all COVID-19 variants by using the tried-and-true prevention methods of wearing masks, staying home when sick, and getting tested when appropriate.”
Earlier this week, officials in California said the first Omicron case was detected in the United States. That person is in good condition and is being treated at a San Francisco hospital, authorities said.
San Francisco health officer Dr. Susan Philip told reporters on Dec. 2 that “this first individual is doing well” and there are no signs that the variant was transmitted in the area.
Neither the California nor Minnesota patients’ identities, including their ages, have been disclosed.
“We’re so happy to hear that and they absolutely contributed to our understanding in San Francisco, and nationally, because they came to our attention, they reported their symptoms and they called us at public health so that we could start the laboratory process to detect the first case in the U.S.,” Philip told CNN.
Around the world, no deaths have been associated with the new variant, and some health officials in South Africa and Israel said that Omicron patients are showing only mild symptoms. Meanwhile, the World Health Organization (WHO) and U.S. health officials have said that more data is needed to determine whether the variant can breach vaccines or natural immunity gained via a previous infection, or whether its symptoms are more severe than the Delta or Alpha CCP virus variants.
In a statement over the past weekend, WHO said the variant appears to be highly transmissible, although the agency has cautioned against issuing unilateral travel bans on certain countries.
