GM: 200 traveling through Atlanta's airport commit to home screening to check for coronavirus
ATLANTA - Two hundred travelers coming through Atlanta, including some who exhibited viral type symptoms similar to those of the new coronavirus currently spreading around the globe, were designated for voluntary home quarantine.
Those results since the start of coronavirus checks were described in a briefing Wednesday afternoon by Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport's General Manager John Selden.
The self-screening of those 200 individuals included daily monitored by medical personnel.
All checked out and did not have to be admitted to a hospital.
So far, of the more than 1,000 passengers screened, only one traveler inbound from South Korea arrived at the airport with critical symptoms and was taken to Emory Hospital for treatment.
Officials say that individual did not have coronavirus and was released after three days.
Selden said, given the virus is touching more countries, more screenings are taking place beyond flights that are origination from Asia.
"Atlanta is in good shape," Selden said. "And nationwide there has been only one person who has come through a U.S. airport with the virus."
MORE: Coronavirus likely to spread in U.S., become a global pandemic, CDC says
While the virus, designated COVID-19, spreads more easily, it has not yet proven to be as deadly as its related coronavirus strands. Of the 44,672 confirmed cases examined, the Chinese CDC said there were 1,023 deaths, which is a mortality rate of 2.3 percent. The 2003 SARS outbreak had a mortality rate of 14 to 15 percent, while MERS had a case fatality of 35 percent, according to the World Health Organization.
In a prior update on the outbreak, the CDC said that they believe the disease is likely to become a global pandemic, though it has not yet been designated that by the World Health Organization.
"Widespread transmission of COVID-19 in the United States would translate into large numbers of people needing medical care at the same time," officials with the CDC said. "Schools, childcare centers, workplaces, and other places for mass gatherings may experience more absenteeism. Public health and healthcare systems may become overloaded, with elevated rates of hospitalizations and deaths."
As of February 23, 14 COVID-19 cases had been diagnosed in the following the United States with one case in Arizona, eight cases in California, two in Illinois, one in Massachusetts, one in Washington, and one in Wisconsin. The CDC reports thats 12 of the cases were connected to traveling to China, and two cases connected to person-to-person transmission with a person confirmed to have COVID-19.
Thirty-six other cases have been reported from a Diamond Princess cruise ship that was docked in Yokohama, Japan. Three more have been reported from U.S. citizens, residents, and family members who had returned from Hubei, China.
On Wednesday, the CDC also announced that they have "identified some inconclusive results," from coronavirus test kits sent to laboratories across the county during quality control tests.
Worry about economic fallout from the coronavirus outbreak has fueled a sharp sell-off of U.S. stocks this week that wiped out the market's gains for the year. The virus continues to spread and threatens to hurt industrial production, consumer spending, and travel.
President Donald Trump will held a news conference Wednesday along with representatives from the Centers for Disease Control, to discuss the virus.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.