As coronavirus spreads no additional measures introduced for Dublin Airport so far
Chinese health officials are warning that the coronavirus is starting to mutate and spread around the world.
The illness has killed nine people in China so far and more than 400 have been infected.
It has travelled as far as the US.
Extra measures are being put in place in airports which have direct flights to Wuhan but Dublin Airport says it has not received instructions from the Department of Health to do so.
“The HSE and Department of Health are the experts in this area," a Dublin Airport spokesperson has said.
"They will issue public health guidance as required and we will liaise with them and follow any and all guidelines.
"Dublin Airport currently has no direct flights to China.”
The World Health Organisation says it is closely monitoring the situation.
Dr Maria Van Kerkhove outlines how you can protect yourself.
"The coronovirus typically causes respiratory symptoms so we recommend basic hand hygiene - just washing your hands with soap and water," said Dr Van Kerkhove.
"We also recommend respiratory hygiene such as when you sneeze, sneeze into your elbow."
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 2002-03 and killed about 800 people.
Officials said it was too early to compare the new virus with Sars (severe acute respiratory syndrome) or Mers (Middle East respiratory syndrome), in terms of how lethal it might be.
They attributed the spike in new cases to improvements in detection and monitoring.
Gao Fu, of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and head of the Chinese Centre for Disease Control, said officials are working on the assumption that the outbreak resulted from human exposure to wild animals being sold illegally at a food market in Wuhan and that the virus is mutating.
Jiao Yahui, a health commission official, said: “The disease will continue to develop. It has developed different features compared with the early stage, and the prevention and precautionary measures need to change accordingly.”
Health officials confirmed earlier this week that the disease can be spread between humans after finding two infected people in Guangdong province in southern China who had not been to Wuhan.
Fifteen medical workers also tested positive for the virus, Wuhan Municipal Health Commission said.
Fourteen of them, one doctor and 13 nurses, were infected by a patient who had been admitted to hospital for neurosurgery but also had the coronavirus.
