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 The announcement signaled a change in tone for the Atlanta-based
U.S. health agency, which had largely been focused on efforts to
stop the virus from entering the country and quarantining
individuals traveling from China.
"The data over the past week about the spread in other countries has
raised our level of concern and expectation that we are going to
have community spread here," Dr. Nancy Messonnier, the CDC's head of
respiratory diseases, told reporters on a conference call.
What is not known, she said, is when it will arrive and how severe a
U.S. outbreak might be. "Disruption to everyday life might be
severe" and businesses, schools and families should begin having
discussions about the possible impact from the spread of the virus,
Messonnier cautioned.
In a teleconference later on Tuesday, Dr. Anne Schuchat, the CDC's
principal deputy director, said that while the immediate risk in the
United States was low, the current global situation suggested a
pandemic was likely.
"It's not a question of if. It's a question of when and how many
people will be infected," Schuchat said.
In San Francisco, California's fourth-largest city, officials
declared a local emergency, despite having no coronavirus cases, in
an effort to raise public awareness of the virus' risks and boost
preparedness.
Separately, U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar
told a Senate subcommittee there will likely be more cases in the
United States, and he asked lawmakers to approve $2.5 billion in
funding to fight the outbreak after proposing cuts to the
department's budget.
"While the immediate risk to individual members of the American
public remains low, there is now community transmission in a number
of countries, including outside of Asia, which is deeply
concerning," Azar said, adding that recent outbreaks in Iran and
Italy were particularly worrying.
Believed to have originated from illegal wildlife sold in the
Chinese city of Wuhan late last year, the new coronavirus has
infected some 80,000 people and killed close to 2,700 in China.
Although the World Health Organization says the epidemic has peaked
in China, coronavirus cases have surfaced in about 30 other
countries, with some three dozen deaths reported, according to a
Reuters tally.
Growing outbreaks in Iran, Italy and South Korea have raised
concerns that coronavirus will surface in other nations and worsen
in those that have already reported infections, further denting a
global economy that had already been hit by a dependence on China.
Global and U.S. stock markets fell sharply again on Tuesday, as
investors feared the epidemic would further damage an already
slowing world economy.
The White House's top economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, said the U.S.
economy would be able to ride out any disruption from the global
spread of coronavirus, adding that he did not expect the Federal
Reserve to cut interest rates to blunt the disease's economic
impact.
U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer, however, said Republican President
Donald Trump and his administration had been caught "flat-footed"
and lacked a comprehensive plan to deal with the coronavirus. He
called for at least $3.1 billion in additional funding to fight it.
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"The Trump administration has shown towering and dangerous incompetence when it
comes to the coronavirus," said Schumer, the Senate's top Democrat. "Mr.
President, you need to get your act together now. This is a crisis."
Trump defended his administration's response. "CDC and my Administration are
doing a GREAT job of handling Coronavirus, including the very early closing of
our borders to certain areas of the world," Trump said on Twitter.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious
Diseases, said it would be at least a year before a coronavirus vaccine could be
made available to the public.
But Fauci said testing Gilead Sciences' <GILD.O> antiviral drug remdesivir for
potential treatment of coronavirus could be done in a "reasonable amount of
time."
'DEADLY CONSEQUENCES'
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told reporters that Iran may have covered up
information about the spread of coronavirus there, and he accused China of
mishandling the epidemic through its "censorship" of media and medical
professionals.
"The United States is deeply concerned by information indicating the Iranian
regime may have suppressed vital details about the outbreak in that country,"
Pompeo told reporters as Iran's coronavirus death toll rose to 16.
"All nations, including Iran, should tell the truth about the coronavirus and
cooperate with international aid organizations," Pompeo said.
His remarks, coming less than two months after a short-lived U.S.-Iranian
military clash and the signing of a U.S.-China trade deal, could inflame
tensions with Tehran and Beijing.
Beijing last week revoked the credentials of three Wall Street Journal
correspondents over a column China said was racist. The United States has said
it was considering a range of responses to their expulsion.
"Expelling our journalists exposes once again the government's issue that led to
SARS and now the coronavirus: namely censorship. It can have deadly
consequences," Pompeo said, referring to the 2002-2003 outbreak of Severe Acute
Respiratory Syndrome, which also emerged from China.
"If China permitted its own and foreign journalists and medical personnel to
speak and investigate freely, Chinese officials and other nations would have
been far better prepared to address the challenge" of coronavirus, he added.
Despite the coronavirus epidemic, Pompeo said the United States still planned to
host a special meeting with the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(ASEAN) in Las Vegas in March.
(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago, Humeyra Pamuk, Richard Cowan, Susan
Heavey, Tim Ahmann and Diane Bartz in Washington, Michael Erman in New York and
Manas Mishra in Bangalore; Writing by Paul Simao; Editing by Bill Berkrot and
Jonathan Oatis)
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