U.S. races to catch up with other countries in COVID-19 sequencing research - CBS News

Public health experts say it was already likely spreading here unseen, a casualty of the country's delayed COVID-19 sequencing campaign, and warned that other new homegrown variants could also be mutating without anyone's knowledge.

The state has expanded its public health staff and equipment to speed its efforts.

Its labs have identified the genetic sequencing of 1,400 samples so far and aim to sequence some 200 samples a week. .

Even before the Colorado case was identified, the state's health department laboratories were running diagnostic tests that could immediately flag potential samples with one of the U.K.

Emily Travanty, scientific director with the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, said it "was truly a bit of luck" that the sample of the first U.K.

She said APHL has heard from labs frustrated with "incredibly tight" supplies used both for sequencing and other laboratory work.

In November, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced it was expanding its own capacity to collect and sequence coronavirus samples from health authorities around the country.

Samples sent to CDC labs identified the first cases of B.1.1.7 in several states, including Texas, Indiana, and Pennsylvania, state public health officials tell CBS News.

The CDC also announced in December it was releasing some $15 million in funding to support local sequencing efforts through the Epidemiology and Laboratory Capacity (ELC) program, which has trickled out to some public health labs on the front lines of the pandemic.

A spokesperson for the Massachusetts State Public Health Laboratory said the agency had received $3.4 million in ELC funds, which had gone to new staff, equipment, and supplies.

In Utah, officials said CARES Act funding and an ELC grant of some $176,000 had helped the state boost sequencing capacity to some 3,000 samples a day