By Steve Geimann
Bloomberg News
WASHINGTON — The U.S. has offered its top public health experts to help China with the coronavirus outbreak but so far Beijing hasn't responded, National Security Adviser Robert O'Brien said Sunday.
"This is a worldwide concern — we want to help our Chinese colleagues if we can," O'Brien said on CBS's "Face the Nation." "We've made the offer and we'll see if they accept."
O'Brien, head of President Donald Trump's National Security Council, said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health have the best experts in the world. So far, Chinese health officials are providing information and the U.S. is "taking that for what it's worth, but at the same time we're monitoring ourselves," he said.
The U.S. has taken steps, effective late Sunday, to limit the entry of people who visited Hubei Province, epicenter of the outbreak in China. U.S. citizens are subject to a 14-day quarantine, while foreign nationals who were in China are barred. Flights from China are being funneled through seven U.S. airports.
U.S. health officials have stressed the risk is low for Americans to become infected. As of Sunday, eight cases have been confirmed, almost all in people who were in China in the past month.
"There's no reason for Americans to panic," O'Brien said. "This is something that is a low risk, we think, in the U.S."
