2 health care workers in Northern California contract coronavirus

Two health care workers in Solano County, California, contracted coronavirus after being exposed to a patient who was not immediately tested for the virus, officials said Sunday.

The patient was treated at NorthBay VacaValley Hospital in Vacaville, but was not tested for COVID-19 coronavirus because she did not fit the federal testing criteria at the time; the woman had not recently traveled overseas or had contact with anyone known to have coronavirus. The patient is now considered the first U.S. case of community spread, where the source of infection is unknown. She has been transferred to UC Davis Medical Center.

"Our two health care workers who tested positively have been in isolation at home since the day we learned they had contact with the patient who had contracted the virus," Aimee Brewer, president of the NorthBay HealthCare Group, said in a statement. "We took immediate and comprehensive measures intended to stop any further spread of the virus, including working with public health officials to trace the contacts the two workers may have had."

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There are more than 60 known cases of COVID-19 in the U.S., with new cases reported Sunday in California, Rhode Island, Washington, and New York.