A senior health official in Northern Ireland has warned that it is only a matter of time before the Covid-19 virus begins to be transmitted more widely and that the number of people diagnosed escalates.
But Dr Gerry Waldron, Head of Health Protection for Northern Ireland's Public Health Agency, stressed that the situation is still within the containment phase.
He was speaking after four new cases of Coronavirus were confirmed in Northern Ireland, bringing the total to 16.
"We are still in containment phase. All the cases so far we can link them to travel from affected areas, or contact with the case that we know has travelled from an affected area," he said.
"So we have not got cases that have just arisen within the community without that travel link."
There are currently no cases of community transmission in Northern Ireland, with all 16 patients who have been diagnosed with Covid-19 linked with travel to northern Italy.
Dr Waldron agreed with the assessment off Northern Ireland's Chief Medical Officer Dr Michael McBride that it is only a matter of time before that situation changes.
"If we follow the same pattern that other countries and communities have travelled, we will get to that stage unfortunately because the virus is quite transmissible," he said.
"But the steps we're taking at the moment to ensure that we stay in this phase of containment as long as possible at the moment appear to be working because we're identifying cases as quickly as possible, we are identifying contacts as quickly as possible, and advising those high risk contacts to go into self isolation for up to 14 days, and that is the principal way at the moment that we keep this virus contained."
Dr Waldron said the numbers diagnosed with the illness will increase dramatically if and when the virus begins to be transmitted within the wider community with no links to anyone who has travelled to an affected area.
"The numbers will start to escalate then because it's going to be much more difficult to identify individuals with the virus," he explained.
"If it's out there in the community, more people will be affected by it, more people will become ill.
"And unfortunately we'll get to the stage where, you know people, older people, people who have inter-current illness, will die from this virus.
"We want to avoid that situation, or we want to delay that situation as long as possible, which is why we're taking this period of containment very seriously."
North ministers to skip US trip over virus concerns - O'Neill
Meanwhile, Northern Ireland's Deputy First Minster Michelle O'Neill, said "it's regrettable" but that it’s the "right decision" to stay at home and prepare for the next phase of coronavirus and not travel to the United States.
Speaking in Stormont this afternoon, Sinn Féin MLA Ms O'Neill said, "we thought it was the right decision".
"We had previously scaled back our trip to Washington and to New York. But now we've just decided, given the fact we have increased cases, that it’s important that we are here to plan for what's going to be inevitably an increased number of cases that we're going to see.
"So myself and the joint First Minister decided that this was the right call, we needed to be here. We need to be ramping up the planning and preparation for the next phase of coronovirus."
She also said it’s important that governments continue to work North-South and east-west.
"I think crucially all the relations are important. But we live on one island. So I think naturally it needs to follow that we approach things on an all-island basis.
She said "the disease isn't going to stop at Derry or Buncrana border, that's just not how it works".
"I think it’s important that whenever we take steps to maybe limit things in the south of Ireland that we do the same here so I think that given the fact that we now have 40 confirmed cases across the island that we need to co-operate in an ongoing way."
Last night Belfast City Council cancelled the St Patrick's Day parade over concerns of containing the spread of the coronavirus.
Today Downpatrick, Newry, Derry and Strabane all announced they have cancelled their celebrations while many other councils said they are going on the advice of the Public Health Agency and will reassess if that advice changes.
