Chinese health authorities urged people in the city of Wuhan to avoid crowds and public gatherings, after warning that a new viral illness that has infected more than 400 people and killed at least nine could spread further.

The appeal came as the World Health Organization convened a group of independent experts to advise whether the outbreak should be declared a global emergency.

The number of new cases has risen sharply in China, the centre of the outbreak. There were 440 confirmed cases as of midnight Tuesday in 13 jurisdictions.

The virus has reached the  United States. A man in Washington state – who recently travelled to Wuhan- has been diagnosed with the deadly strain of coronavirus.

Here in Trinidad, the  Min­istry of Health is ac­ti­vat­ing emer­gency pro­to­cols. And that includes ther­mal body scan­ning at all ports of en­try and activating the isolation unit at Caura.

The World Health Organization says a typ­i­cal pre­sen­ta­tion of the  dis­ease is fever, cough and short­ness of breath. Pneu­mo­nia is a com­mon find­ing, but not al­ways present. Gas­troin­testi­nal symp­toms, in­clud­ing di­ar­rhoea, have al­so been re­port­ed. Se­vere ill­ness can cause res­pi­ra­to­ry fail­ure.

Evidence has shown that the disease has been transmitted through the respiratory tract and there is the possibility of viral mutation.

The illness comes from a newly identified type of coronavirus, a family of viruses that can cause the common cold as well as more serious illnesses such as the SARS outbreak that spread from China to more than a dozen countries in 2002-2003 and killed about 800 people.