SIMLA, Colorado – This isolated community of farmers on the high plains is the last place where local residents hope to be first for anything, especially a new, more infectious variant of the coronavirus. But on Wednesday, state health officials announced that the first known case of the variant in the United States was confirmed in a National Guard soldier sent to help with a Covid-19 outbreak at the city’s Good Samaritan asylum.
A second soldier from the nursing home tested positive and may also have the variant, Emily Travanty, the acting director of the state public health lab, said on Wednesday in a conference call with reporters.
All 26 residents of the nursing home and 20 of their 24 regular employees tested positive for coronavirus in the past few weeks, and four residents died. It was not clear whether the two National Guard soldiers were infected at the health facility or contracted the virus before reaching Simla. They arrived on December 23, after most cases occurred at the facility, said Dr. Rachel Herlihy, an Colorado state epidemiologist.
Simla is an unlikely place for a newly detected virus variant to appear in the UK. Many things that happen do not happen here. Trends come and go without notice. News is usually viewed from a distance. For generations, this 6,000-foot short grasswind prairie stretch, some 80 miles southeast of Denver, has been shaped primarily by the timeless rhythms of cattle raising.
On Wednesday morning, after the news of the Simla virus, a resident was asked what had changed on the city’s paved street in the 29 years she lived there. She looked west towards the tangle of snow-covered lawn mowers outside MT Small Engine Repair, then east, where a flock of wild turkeys languidly crossed the main street in front of the totally empty Coach-Lite Motel and said : “Nothing. “
This remained virtually true when the virus arrived in the United States earlier this year. Many of Simla’s nearly 600 residents continued their lives on the assumption that, like most things that sweep the country, the pandemic would pass through them.
“When the virus started in the spring, it was delivery time and we were too busy to pay much attention,” Don Bailey, a retired biology professor who now breeds black Angus cattle on a farm outside the city. “We were checking the herd five or six times a day, and you don’t have to wear a mask to go out with the cows.”
The summer passed with almost no cases in the county, and community life continued with little change. 4-H members showed their award-winning sheep and cattle at the county fair, the school remained in operation and veterans still gathered for coffee each morning at Simla’s only breakfast spot, the Country Corner Cafe.
“We went ahead and canceled a dinner we had with friends every Wednesday, but other than that things generally remained the same,” said Bailey, the 71-year-old farmer. Even with the pandemic, he kept the old saddle museum of a man he built in an outbuilding in its spread open – although the flow of visitors would hardly break most social distance regulations.
The city’s sense of isolation from the global problem changed later this fall when a second wave of infections swept Colorado and hit Simla and the surrounding Elbert County particularly hard, bringing it to the threat level of “ serious risk ”of the state, where it remains today. Soon, almost everyone in this close-knit community knew someone who was sick.
“I have a friend in the ICU right now,” said Cené Kurtchi, 71, who runs the cafe with her husband, Michael. “There are a lot of sick people in the city. They’ll say it’s just flu or bronchitis, but it’s 26 miles to the nearest place where you can get tested. “
The response to the virus is shaped not only by geography, but also by politics. President Trump got 74% of the vote here in November. Signs that support him still spring up on almost every block. One on the fence of a quiet side street said: “SAVE FREEDOM, VOTE FOR TRUMP.”
In a pandemic in which precautions have become political, many residents refuse to wear masks. On Wednesday, about a quarter of customers who entered the Simla Food Store had their faces uncovered, despite being only half a block from the health facility, where the entire patient population recently tested positive and the mutant virus appeared.
Mrs. Kurtchi shook her head when discussing the lack of masks. Some of her longtime neighbors have called for a coffee boycott because she and her husband need masks.
On Wednesday, television news crews gathered in front of the modest one-story nursing home, while cleaning crews in suits against dangerous materials passed discreetly through a back door, where the strong smell of cleaning products wafted on. an alley.
The state sent a team to the nursing home on Tuesday to collect new specimens from residents and staff. Based on the samples tested so far, said Herlihy, it does not appear that the variant is circulating at the facility, but more samples were being tested on Wednesday.
The National Guard soldier confirmed that the variant is isolating at home in Arapahoe County, on the outskirts of Denver, and the one with the suspicious case is isolating at a hotel in the eastern city of Limon, said Herlihy.
At Simla’s lonely craft store, on a dirt road where the only visitors were half a dozen local cats resting in the winter sun outside the front door, the owner, Carla Tracy, had just hung up the phone with a friend who had told her the new variant had come to her city.
“My God, this little town that most people can’t even find on the map,” she said. “And we thought we wouldn’t have a lot of problems with the virus. So it hit us. It will only show that it is everywhere. “