Health officials in Nassau County, New York, said on Wednesday they were monitoring 83 people who visited China and may have come in contact with the coronavirus.
But Governor Andrew Cuomo said the state has had no confirmed cases so far.
‘This situation is not a situation that should cause undue fear,’ Cuomo told a news conference, saying that 27 people in New York have tested negative for the virus.
At a separate news conference, officials in Nassau County, just east of New York City on Long Island, said that while they were monitoring 83 people, there were no confirmed cases in the county so far.
‘I’m happy to say right now, we don’t have a case,’ County Health Commissioner Dr Lawrence Eisenstein said.
Earlier on Wednesday Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said that there were a total of 60 confirmed cases of coronavirus in the United States so far.
New York City hasn’t reported any patients under investigation, but in Chinatown people are already wearing protective masks (pictured). Nearby Nassau county has 83 residents in self-isolation
Most new cases are among the Americans evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship that was quarantined in Japan for two weeks after one infected passenger quickly spread coronavirus to more than 700 people onboard.
Four ship passengers had died, as of Wednesday afternoon.
So far, there have been no deaths in the US, although one American died in Wuhan, China, the outbreak’s epicenter.
At least 42 of the infected Americans were evacuated from the ship, three were evacuated from Wuhan, 12 were diagnosed after traveling to China, and two of those patients
Officials have not yet revealed how the most recently diagnosed patient acquired the life-threatening infection, according to the Washington Post.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed the positive test results of an additional six cruise evacuees, including four that had already been announced by local health departments.
At least five of the new patients were evacuated from the Diamond Princess cruise ship last week. They were then transported to three different quarantine sites: military bases in California and Texas and the National Quarantine Unit in Nebraska.
Global cases have now surged past 81,000, with well over 2,700 deaths – though the vast majority of fatalities have still occurred in China, where the outbreak began.
The announcements come after CDC officials warned Americans to prepare for the infection to spread, despite President Trump’s reassurances that the virus is ‘under control’ in the US.
Currently, all 83 individuals are in voluntary self-quarantine, meaning that they’ve agreed to isolate themselves at home, away from friends and family, for 14 days, which scientists believe is the outside bound of the virus’s contagious period.
A total of 60 Americans now have coronavirus, but 45 of those cases are in people held in quarantines after evacuation from Wuhan or the cruise, while only a small number were detected in the US after traveling to China. The source of one infection remains unclear
One was initially under mandatory quarantine, but had been allowed to move to self-isolation after criteria changed, ABC7 reported.
Quarantine can be mandated and enforced if necessary, but so far it hasn’t been in Nassau county.
The current group are among 175 people n the county who have undergone voluntary isolation, Nassau County Department of Health Commissioner Dr Lawrence Eisenstein told reporters at a Wednesday press conference.
So far, five Nassau residents have tested negative for coronavirus. Officials are still awaiting the results of one test.
The CDC has stopped posting the states where it is investigating individuals, but has tested a total 445 people.
On Wednesday, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar dismissed claims that President Trump was considering appointing an epidemic czar to replace him and oversee the US’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak.
President Trump announced Wednesday morning that he would hold a press briefing about coronavirus at 6pm that evening, after lawmakers criticized his administration’s response.