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Covid-19: an inflatable costume at the origin of a cluster in the United States?

 

A California hospital was investigating Monday, January 4, 2021 to determine whether an inflatable disguise worn by one of its employees on Christmas Day could have been the source of an outbreak of the new coronavirus which has infected dozens of people and caused a death. At least 44 employees at the Kaiser Permanente center in San Jose, near San Francisco, contracted Covid-19 last week and one of them died due to complications from the disease, according to a spokesperson of the hospital.

The hospital center opened an investigation to determine if a disguise worn by an employee was involved. It’s an innocent inflatable Christmas tree, with a big smile and a big red nose, but some wonder if the fan that the costume is equipped to stay inflated could not have helped to diffuse droplets laden with virus in the air of the emergency room.

“It was not an activity organized or sanctioned by Kaiser Permanente,” the spokesperson said in a statement. Any possible exposure to the coronavirus “would be completely unintentional and accidental, because the person had no symptoms of Covid and was only seeking to boost the morale of those around him during a very stressful time,” she said.

At least 350,000 deaths across the Atlantic

According to local NBC television, the first to report the information, the deceased was an administrative worker in the emergency department. The channel quoted another hospital employee as believing that the outbreak could have been caused by respiratory care performed in a room that was not designed for this purpose. The coronavirus is spread in particular via droplets emitted by patients when they breathe, speak, sing, cough or sneeze.

Some employees at the Kaiser Permanente center had already received a first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, but it takes about two weeks for the body to produce enough antibodies to counter the infection. The two vaccines authorized so far also require a booster three or four weeks later. According to Kaiser Permanente, employees who had received their first injection less than ten days previously would not, therefore, have been immunized on the day of their exposure to the coronavirus. The hospital offered rapid tests to all its employees and carried out a deep disinfection of the emergency department.

California is one of the US states most affected by Covid-19 today, with more than 21,500 people hospitalized. The pandemic has claimed more than 350,000 lives in the United States, where some 20.6 million cases have already been identified.

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