February 6, 2021, 2:46 pm HST
A second case of COVID-19 with variant B.1.1.7 was confirmed in Hawaii.
The Division of State Laboratories at the Hawaii Department of Health reports that both cases involve individuals on O’ahu. None of them has travel history.
Individuals are not known to have had contact with each other.
The DOH Disease Outbreak Control Division is continuing to actively investigate both cases and ensuring that both individuals are isolated and contacts are quarantined.
The two recent confirmations were among four samples previously identified in Hawaii as having a molecular track consistent with variant B.1.1.7. The other specimens are still being analyzed.
Variant B.1.1.7, originally detected in the United Kingdom, is highly transmissible and leads to faster spread than other common COVID-19 strains.
The State Laboratories Division is carrying out genome sequencing on 300 specimens per month.