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More than 400 people have tested positive in the United States and at least 19 people have died from the illness, most of them from Washington state.
But positive tests are coming from all parts of the country. Utah officials reported the state’s first case Friday, a patient over 60 who’d just returned from a cruise ship that’s now facing an outbreak off California’s coast.

That same day, Florida reported its first two deaths, both patients who had recently traveled internationally.

Passengers heard about cruise ship outbreak from news

A cruise ship with thousands aboard and 21 infected with the virus is coming closer to land as one passenger required medical assistance, the captain announced in a video sent to CNN.

“This will allow greater ease in managing logistics and the delivery of supplies,” the captain said. A helicopter was dispatched to the ship to airlift a passenger early Saturday to San Francisco, according to another passenger aboard, Steven Smith. The captain made the announcement over the ship’s internal public address system, Smith told CNN.

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With the number of cases aboard, the captain said Friday it was unlikely the ship would be disembarking Saturday morning as scheduled.

Vice President Mike Pence announced Friday that people aboard the Grand Princess cruise ship, which has been in limbo off the California coast, tested positive for the virus.

It was the first time passengers aboard heard about the test results.

“I thought the passengers were supposed to be notified first,” said Debbi Loftus, who’s celebrating her father’s 84th birthday aboard the Grand Princess. “The fact that we weren’t told first made us quite upset and angry. … There’s no excuse for this.”

Test kits were dropped aboard after officials learned that a California man who died of the virus this week traveled on the same ship in February to Mexico.

The nursing home at the heart of US outbreak

Of the 16 coronavirus deaths in Washington state, at least 10 have been associated with Life Care Center in suburban Seattle, according to the King County Health Department.

Officials on Friday confirmed the death of a man in his 60s. He was not a resident of the nursing facility, but was a visitor, the King County Health Department said in a news release.

Families of Kirkland nursing home residents in quarantine after coronavirus outbreak demand more answers

The Kirkland facility’s outbreak left family members in a desperate search for answers about what kind of procedures the nursing center was following and whether residents are being tested for the virus.

Pat Herrick, whose mother died Thursday at the facility, said she was pushing officials to have her mother’s remains tested to see if she had the virus. The cause of death was listed as natural causes, Herrick said.

Her mother had lived at the facility for nearly seven years. Herrick emphasized the care her mother received from the nursing home workers had been excellent, but she didn’t think the staff has enough resources to deal with the outbreak, she added.

Across Washington state, 103 people have tested positive for the virus.

One New York community hit with dozens of cases

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced 21 new cases on Saturday, bringing the state’s total to 76. The rising number of cases prompted the governor to declare a state of emergency, which permits officials to hasten purchasing, hiring and testing protocols related to the disease.

Westchester County Executive George Latimer, center, and New Rochelle Mayor Noam Bramson, right, are surrounded by the press as they eat lunch at Eden Wok Kosher Chinese in New Rochelle, New York, on March 5, 2020.

Fifty-seven of the cases are in Westchester County, where health officials previously ordered a synagogue in New Rochelle to halt services over fears a man who tested positive for the virus may have exposed others.

“Westchester is an obvious problem for us,” Cuomo said Saturday.

The county’s health commissioner urged congregants who attended certain events last month to self-quarantine until at least Saturday. The rabbi of the synagogue tested positive for the virus Friday, officials said.

Local health officials were taking steps to clean public facilities but are not restricting public gatherings, they said. New Rochelle is a suburb about 20 miles from New York City.

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“This is a significant and fast-evolving challenge for our community, but it’s important not to panic,” New Rochelle Mayor Noam Bramson said in a statement. “Public health experts remind us that the majority of people who contract coronavirus will recover without incident, and only a small fraction will experience life-threatening circumstances.

The governor has asked more than 2,500 people in New York to self-quarantine as officials search for anyone who may have come in contact with ill residents.

Officials on Tuesday confirmed one case of the virus spreading from person-to-person. By Friday, that number had jumped to more than 40 cases.

“We want to keep testing and finding more people who are testing positive because that’s how you contain the outbreak – find the person who got infected, quarantine them and reduce the infection rate,” Cuomo said in a news release.

CNN’s Giulia McDonnell Nieto del Rio, Sarah Moon, Shimon Prokupecz, Andy Rose and Alta Spells contributed to this report.

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