April 22 (UPI) — The first coronavirus-related death in the United States occurred in early February — weeks earlier than previously believed, health officials in California said late Tuesday.
The Santa Clara, Calif., Medical Examiner-Coroner said a new autopsy report showed a resident there died on Feb. 6 after picking up COVID-19.
Previously, the earliest known coronavirus-related death in the United States was recorded Feb. 29, a man in his 50s in Washington state.
The coroner said another Santa Clara resident died from COVID-19 on Feb. 17. In both cases, she received confirmation from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
California health officials said they are now expanding the scope of who should be tested to include some residents who aren’t showing typical coronavirus symptoms. They issued the new guidelines last weekend and are now screening asymptomatic people from “congregate settings,” such as homeless shelters.
There have so far been more than 826,000 coronavirus cases in the United States and more than 45,100 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University. The school said more than 4.1 million tests have been performed to date.
The first positive test on a U.S. patient was recorded in Washington state on Jan. 22. That person had traveled to Wuhan, China, which was the initial global epicenter for the disease. Santa Clara County forms part of the famous Silicon Valley technology hub, which has ties to China.(function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(d.getElementById(id))return;js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=’https://embed.ex.co/sdk.js’;fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}(document,’script’,’playbuzz-sdk’));
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