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A woman in Chicago who recently returned from a visit to Wuhan, China, is the second U.S. patient to test positive for the coronavirus that has killed at least 26 and sickened hundreds in Asia. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said Friday it expects more cases in the U.S.
The woman, in her 60s, is hospitalized in Chicago. The first patient is a Washington state man who’d also been to Wuhan, the outbreak’s epicenter in central China’s Hubei Province.
Physician Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said at a news briefing Friday that while the immediate risk to the American public remains low, “it’s a rapidly changing situation.”
The World Health Organization (WHO) convened this week to decide whether to declare this outbreak a global health emergency and decided it was “too early” to do so. Meanwhile, the U.S. began funneling all travelers arriving from Wuhan into five major international airports for screening: San Francisco, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Chicago and New York’s John F. Kennedy. But “the circumstances have clearly changed,” said internist and infectious disease specialist Martin Cetron, director of the CDC’s Division of Global Migration and Quarantine.
Chinese officials in Wuhan and a growing number of surrounding cities have implemented strict travel bans. (Officials in China are especially concerned with Saturday’s start of the Chinese New Year holiday, a busy time for travel throughout the country.) And, considering that both of the people who have tested positive for the virus in the U.S. were asymptomatic when they arrived, Cetron added, “we are reevaluating our approach.”
More than 2,000 passengers on about 200 incoming flights have been screened, with no new cases identified.
The Chicago woman arrived in the U.S. from China on Jan. 13 with no symptoms of illness, officials said. When she later became sick, she contacted her doctor, who referred her to a hospital with proper infection control capabilities, according to Allison Arwady, commissioner of Chicago’s Department of Public Health — adding that this is the appropriate protocol for anyone who suspects they may have the virus. Arwady said that “since returning from China [the patient has] had limited movement,” which is “very reassuring.” The woman is doing well, in stable condition, and remains hospitalized primarily for infection control, she said.
