
Michelle L. Price and Bobby Caina CalvanThe Associated PressNEW YORK (AP) — The Omicron variant of COVID-19, which had been undetected in the U.S. before the middle of this week, had been discovered in at least 30 states by Monday, Dec. 13, showing yet again how mutations of the virus can circumnavigate the globe with speed and ease.Just a day after the first known U.S. case was found in California, tests showed the Omicron variant had infected at least five people in the New York City metropolitan area, two people from San Diego County, seven from Los Angeles County and a man from Minnesota who had attended an anime convention in Manhattan in late November.A Colorado woman who had recently traveled to southern Africa, a Hawaii resident with no recent travel history, and