Labs across U.S. test for COVID Omicron variant
CBSN
Labs across the United States are testing to see where Omicron COVID-19 variant will emerge first. The U.S. is sequencing 80,000 positive PCR tests per week to test for variants and learn how fast the variant is spreading — and how infectious it is.
About 2,000 of those sequences occur at the Pandemic Response Lab in New York City, which "CBS Mornings" lead national correspondent David Begnaud visited.
The lab is "sequencing the COVID genome of thousands of positive COVID samples," said Jon Laurent, head of research and development at the lab.
Ashley White received her earliest combat action badge from the United States Army soon after the first lieutenant arrived in Afghanistan. The silver military award, recognizing soldiers who've been personally engaged by an attacker during conflict, was considered an achievement in and of itself as well as an affirming rite of passage for the newly deployed. White had earned it for using her own body to shield a group of civilian women and children from gunfire that broke out in the midst of her third mission in Kandahar province. All of them survived. She never mentioned the badge to anyone in her battalion.