Hawaii says COVID-19 ‘variants of concern’ now account for majority of cases in state

Hawaii’s health officials said Wednesday that recent data shows COVID-19 “variants of concern” now account for a majority of the state’s new illnesses. The Department of Health’s State Laboratories Division (SLD) noted that the first variant of concern was detected on Jan. 21, 2021, and since then there have been 1,023 specimens reported. 

“Variants of concern now make up more than 90% of the genomes sequenced by our lab,” Dr. Edward Desmond, SLD director, said in a news release. “We…