MANILA, Philipines — Three US Navy sailors aboard an aircraft carrier sailing in the Philippine Sea tested positive for the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19), the US Department of Defense or Pentagon confirmed.
Acting US Navy Secretary Thomas Modly said the three sailors have been evacuated from aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt after being diagnosed with the disease.
"We've identified all the folks they've had contact with, and we're quarantining them as well," Modly said at a Pentagon press conference on Tuesday.
"This is an example of how we are able to keep our ships deployed at seas and underway, even with active COVID-19 cases," he added.
The three sailors have been flown off the aircraft carrier to a US Defense Department hospital in the Pacific, USNI News reported.
According to a report from ABC News, about 5,000 crew members are aboard the warship currently in the Philippine Sea.
"Our force remains on watch throughout the world [during] this crisis, and they're continuing to execute their primary mission under the National Defense Strategy," Modly said.
In the same press briefing, US Navy Adm. Michael Gilday, chief of naval operations, said it was still unclear where the virus came from.
The aircraft carrier's last port call was in Da Nang, Vietnam, 15 days before the US Navy sailors were diagnosed.
"I think it would be difficult to tie down these active cases to that particular port visit. We’ve had aircraft flying to and from the ship, and so we just don’t want to say it was that particular port visit. We took great precautions when that crew came back from that shore period to do enhanced medical screening of the crew," Gilday said.
Gilday noted that the three sailors who tested positive for the virus are "running a temperature" and have some body aches but wouldn't necessarily be characterized as needing hospitalization.
"But they’re positive, those three cases. So we are rapidly removing them from the ship, and we are understanding who they came in contact with over the recent days and weeks so we can begin to take a look inside the ship, how we can isolate and contain as best we can," the admiral said.
The number of deaths around the world from the novel coronavirus now stands at 18,259, according to a tally compiled by AFP on Tuesday from official sources.
More than 404,020 declared cases have been registered in 175 countries and territories since the epidemic first emerged in China in December.
The tallies, using data collected by AFP offices from national authorities and information from the World Health Organization (WHO), likely reflect only a fraction of the actual number of infections. — Patricia Lourdes Viray with AFP