More Virus Evacuees Land in US

All will be quarantined for 14 days, officials say
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Feb 7, 2020 5:35 PM CST
More Virus Evacuees Land at US Bases
Members of President Trump's coronavirus task force, from left, the CDC's Robert Redfield, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar, and Deputy Secretary of State Stephen Biegun, hold a news conference Friday in Washington.   (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Hundreds more people evacuated from the virus zone in China began arriving Friday at military bases across the US to begin a two-week quarantine. There were no signs of illness among those who flew into Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, said Dr. Jennifer McQuiston of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. She said fewer than 100 people, including babies, will stay at Lackland, the AP reports, she but did not have an exact number. The plane arrived from the Wuhan region of China, the center of the outbreak of the new coronavirus. It was scheduled to drop off more people later Friday in Omaha. A military base in San Diego also received Americans who will be quarantined. Earlier evacuation flights brought people to March Air Reserve Base in Southern California and Travis Air Force Base between San Francisco and Sacramento.

U.S. officials said at a news conference in Washington on Friday that more than 800 people have been brought from Wuhan on recent flights. All evacuees are being quarantined for 14 days and monitored for signs of illness. The new virus is in the coronavirus family that includes Middle East respiratory syndrome, or MERS, and severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS. It causes fever, cough, shortness of breath and, in severe cases, pneumonia. It has sickened more than 31,000 people and killed more than 600, virtually all in China. (Trump's reelection campaign could benefit from a coronavirus bump, one analysis says.)

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