Australia has confirmed its first four cases of the coronavirus, with the first patient hospitalised in a stable condition in a suburb of Melbourne, health officials said on Saturday.
The Chinese national, in his 50s, arrived from China on 19 January on a flight from Guangzhou, Victoria health minister Jenny Mikakos told journalists.
“It is important to stress that there is no cause for alarm to the community,” Ms Mikakos said on Friday. “The patient is isolated and is undergoing treatment and we do not have any further suspected cases at this stage.”
Another three cases were confirmed on Saturday in New South Wales, where officials said the risk of infection remained low. All three men, aged in their thirties, forties and fifties, were being treated in Sydney hospitals.
The deadly virus is spreading rapidly; on Friday, the first cases in Europe were confirmed after France declared three had fallen ill.
China also revised its death toll upwards of 15 on Saturday, bringing the total number of people killed by the illness to 41.
The country has been forced to put a lockdown on more than 41 million people and stop travel in and out of Wuhan, where the disease is thought to have originated from.
The total number of cases worldwide, which has been rapidly increasing by the day, is now estimated to be more than 1,200.
Most cases are in the central Chinese city of Wuhan,, but cases have also been confirmed in France, the United States, Thailand, Hong Kong, Macau, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore and Vietnam.
The UK is also believed to be tracking down some 2,000 people who arrived in the country from China in the last two weeks, with public health officials warning that it is “highly likely” that there will be cases in Britain.
