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Personnel in biological hazard suits await passengers evacuated from Wuhan, the Chinese city at the heart of a growing outbreak of the deadly 2019 Novel Coronavirus shortly after the plane landed at March Air Reserve Base in Riverside, California on January 29, 2020.
Matt Hartman | AFP via Getty Images
U.S. agencies said Wednesday that the flight carrying U.S. citizens evacuated from Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak, safely arrived in California.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Wednesday that the flight landed at the March Air Reserve Base in Riverside, California. A team of CDC medical officers screened the nearly 200 passengers upon their arrival.
The flight was carrying U.S. State Department personnel as well as American civilians.
The government-chartered flight departed from Wuhan Tianhe International Airport and touched down in Anchorage, Alaska to refuel before continuing on to California. All passengers were screened twice in Alaska and CDC health officials approved them all to continue, the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services said. All passengers were screened twice before departure in China, too, the Alaska DHSS said, and monitored during the flight.
“For many of us directly involved, this has been a moving and uplifting experience,” Alaska’s Chief Medical Officer Dr. Anne Zink said. “The whole plane erupted in cheers when the crew said, ‘Welcome home to the United States.'”
Now that the flight has arrived in California, the CDC said all passengers are asked to remain at the March Air Reserve Base for further CDC screening and testing. If any passengers begin to exhibit symptoms consistent with the coronavirus, the CDC said they will be transported to a hospital.
Representatives from the CDC were not immediately available for comment.
The coronavirus outbreak has now killed 133 people in China and infected more than 6,150 people around the world. WHO officials said Wednesday there are currently 71 cases outside of China in 15 other countries.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the “continued increase in cases and the evidence of human-to-human transmission outside of China are, of course, most deeply disturbing.” The illness produces a range of symptoms with about 20% of the patients becoming severely ill, including pneumonia and respiratory failure, he said.
“Although the numbers outside China are still relatively small, they hold the potential for a much larger outbreak,” Tedros said.