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Trump says US coronavirus spread 'not inevitable,' mulls new travel bans

US President Donald Trump gestures as he speaks during a news conference on the COVID-19 outbreak at the White House on February 26, 2020. (Photo by AFP)

US President Donald Trump says it is "not inevitable" that the novel coronavirus would continue to spread in the United States, adding he is considering travel restrictions on Italy and South Korea and appointed his vice president to lead the response.

His optimism about containing the pathogen contradicted a senior health official in his own administration and came as authorities said they had identified the first case in the US that was of unknown origin.

"I don't think it's inevitable. I think that there's a chance that it could get worse, a chance it could get fairly substantially worse, but nothing's inevitable," Trump told reporters on Wednesday at the White House.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention urged Americans Tuesday to be prepared to cancel mass gatherings and urged schools and businesses to develop teleworking plans, amid dire warnings that countries are not ready to contain an outbreak that has infected 80,000 people, mostly in China.


As of Wednesday, there were 60 cases in the United States -- 15 detected through the public health system, and 45 repatriated from abroad, either from a cruise ship off Japan or from Wuhan, the Chinese city where the first cases were identified.

The CDC later said the latest case caught in California "did not have relevant travel history or exposure to another known patient" -- meaning it could represent the first instance of "community spread" in the US, though this was not yet confirmed.


More travel restrictions? 

Foreign nationals traveling from China within the past two weeks are currently banned from entering the US, and Trump said more countries, including South Korea and Italy where the disease has rapidly spread, could also be added to the list.




The president added that Vice President Mike Pence had been assigned to lead the charge in coordinating the government's response and reporting back to him, taking over the role from health secretary Alex Azar. 

(Source: AFP)
