A great - nan in Kansas who died in former January 2020 has been recorded as the first decease from COVID-19 in the US , weeks before the first last make by the fresh infection were first reported in the state .
Lovell “ Cookie ” Brown , a 78 - twelvemonth - old great - grannie from Leavenworth , decease in a infirmary on January 9 , 2020 . The cause of death was initially record as a stroke and continuing obstructive lung disease . Then in May 2021 , the death certificate was change to tote up “ COVID 19 PNEUMONIA ” as one of the crusade of her decease , as unveil by an investigation byBay Area News Group .
A case from the second hebdomad of 2020 has since been include on theofficial log of COVID-19 deathspublished by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention . It ’s thought that this display case represents Brown ’s death .
However , much of Brown ’s tale is shrouded in mystery . Her identity did n’t become public due to patient privacy constabulary . moreover , the infirmary or country wellness officials did not send word any of the patient role ’s relatives , who only discovered the amendment after being adjoin by reporters from Bay Area News Group .
Despite the news coming as a shock , the family had suspected that their darling nan Lovell may have contracted COVID-19 when intelligence of the pandemic later hit based on her symptoms , namely lose her appreciation around Christmas time .
It ’s not certain how Brown caught the infection since she scarcely traveled in her old age , but in the months leading up to her death , she had spent some metre in a communal nursing home , a set whichhas been associatedwith desolate COVID-19 outbreaks .
When the pandemic was first look at ascendant in late-2019 / early-2020 , wellness authorities reported the first case ofCOVID-19 on US soilon January 15 2020 after a human beings from Washington returned to the US after a trip-up to Wuhan , the Chinese city where the outbreak was first identified . Thefirst known COVID-19 deathin the US emerged a couple of weeks later on February 6 in California .
Now , it appears this timeline has been pushed backed by a few workweek . AnotherBay Area News Group investigationfound five destruction certificates in five states — California , Oklahoma , Alabama , Wisconsin , and Kansas — from January 2020 that have been amend to admit COVID-19 as a factor in the death .
Theinitial stage of the COVID-19 pandemicstill remain hazy , although there has beensome evidence that the viruswas pass around around the world slightly before than wellness potency initially recognized . For example , Europe ’s first confirmed COVID-19 infection wasofficially identifiedin France on January 24 , 2020 , but a hospital in Paris retested a sample taken from a man with a flu - alike illness just after Christmas and found he waspotentially infected with COVID-19as early as December 27 , 2019 .
