"To date, we have a 110 of what we are calling Persons Under Investigation, or PUI, from 26 states", Nancy Messonnier, the director for Immunization and respiratory diseases at the CDC, told reporters. "This is a cumulative number and will only increase. We still only have 5 confirmed positives and 32 that have tested negative".
The CDC said on its website that the five cases involved US persons who had traveled back from the Chinese city of Wuhan, the reported epicenter of the novel coronavirus outbreak.
Most recently, the infection was discovered in Los Angeles, California. Other states with cases are Arizona, Illinois and Washington.
The US Department of State alerted Americans in a travel advisory on Monday to "reconsider travel to China due to novel coronavirus".
The State Department pointed out that the CDC has not yet issued a level 3 warning for all of China, however, the Chinese authorities are introducing quarantines and restricting travel throughout the country. The State Department issued earlier the Level 4 "do not travel" advisory for Hubei province.
The virus has killed at least 80 people and infected nearly 3,000 in China, spreading to more than a dozen of countries.
World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus announced on Sunday that he was traveling to Beijing to discuss measures to contain the coronavirus outbreak, which started in December 2019 in the city of Wuhan.
