A medical worker gives a Covid-19 test to a traveler at the international terminal at San Francisco International Airport on Thursday, December 2, 2021.
Nebraska officials confirmed six infections after a traveler returned from Nigeria, and at least six other states have at least a dozen cases of the variant.
On Wednesday and Thursday, the nation's first cases of the variant in a patient in San Francisco and Los Angeles were reported.
The first patient in Nebraska became sick after returning from Nigeria.
The department said that none of the six people required hospitalization.
There are five confirmed cases in New York, one in Suffolk County on Long Island, two in Queens, one in Brooklyn and one in New York City. The second variant case in the U.S. was confirmed by Minnesota public health officials.
The U.S. is one of 38 countries with confirmed cases of the omicron variant.
Pre-departure testing rules for international flights have been tightened by President Joe Biden as part of a broader strategy to curb the spread of the new variant.
The variant of omicron has been reported in New York and Hawaii.
The New York City Health Commissioner told reporters at a press conference that Omicron has already been identified in other parts of the world.
Omicron has more than 30 changes to the spikeProtein, which the virus uses to attach to human cells. According to the WHO, some of the genes are associated with higher transmission and a decrease in protection.
Health officials in the U.S. and around the world are concerned that the variant may affect the effectiveness of vaccines.
The White House's chief medical advisor said Wednesday that the kind of mutations seen in omicron might be more transmissible. We don't know that now.
