LOWELL, Mich. — Liako Anderson was born in and now lives in West Michigan, where she goes to college. However, she grew up in South Africa. Her parents live there now, and she tries to see them when possible. The pandemic made that challenging, but she was finally able to visit over the holidays.
"Since there were travel restrictions for the whole year to South Africa," said Anderson, "when it finally opened up in September, when the borders finally opened back up, I just jumped on the opportunity. I hadn't seen my parents in basically a year."
Anderson said policies for entering South Africa were tight. She had a COVID-19 test prior to flying, it was negative.
Her parents live on a farm in a rural part of Free State, South Africa. It is summer there, and Anderson said she spent a "fantastic" time visiting family, hiking, and barbequing. Due to their remote location, they were basically isolating together.
She took another COVID-19 test before boarding a plane back to Michigan on January 9. It was negative. She self-isolated when she returned, and took another test a few days later. It was positive.
"I was just so shocked, I couldn't believe it," said Anderson, "It just really like hit me hard. I was very worried for my grandparents."
She has been self-isolating for 13 days. In that time, she has not had a single symptom of COVID-19. However, she lives with her grandparents, and made sure they were tested as well. Both were negative.
When she heard about the South Africa variant of the virus, she was concerned because she had just returned from the country. However, her test results did not say anything about the variant, just that she was positive for the virus. She does not know if she has the variant.
13 ON YOUR SIDE reached out to the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS). We learned everyone who is tested for COVID-19 through a state lab, also gets tested for possible variants of the virus. However, if someone is tested through an independent lab, they are only randomly selecting COVID tests to look for variants. That means there is no accurate way to know how many cases of the variants, or which variants of COVID-19, there may be in the state.
As for Anderson, she emphasized the importance of self-isolating after a trip, even though she had no symptoms of the virus.
"I think it's very important to not only think of yourself, but others and the collective future for everyone in this country," said Anderson, "Because seeing these numbers climb every day, it does kind of put a damper on one's soul."
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