In Michigan coronavirus surge, more patients are younger and healthier.

Jim Dover, CEO and president of Sparrow Health System, a large health care provider in central Michigan, said two things are driving the current surge: pandemic fatigue and mutations in the coronavirus that have made it more contagious and possibly more deadly.

 

"This variant is more virulent, and so therefore more infectious, and so easier to catch," said Dover. "Second is everyone is tired of wearing masks, so you will go out and see a lack of social distancing, the lack of wearing masks. The virus is invisible and people did not know they're walking through a cloud of Covid, and next thing you know, they're infected."

 

Both the B.1.351 and highly contagious B.1.1.7 variants have been identified in Michigan, but the B.1.1.7 strain is now spreading throughout the community. The state health department has identified more than 1,200 instances of the B.1.1.7 variant. The actual number is likely much higher considering the difficulty in determining which variant is causing cases throughout the state -- the samples have to be sent to a state lab for time-consuming DNA analysis to determine the variant.