There are many indications that the coronavirus is closing in on Idaho.

The deadly flu-like illness has killed 16 people in neighboring Washington state and sickened over 100 others there, Washington health officials reported Saturday.

In an unprecedented step to thwart the spread of the virus, the University of Washington announced Friday that it would stop holding in-person classes at its three campuses and instead provide its nearly 60,000 students with online instruction starting Monday and continuing until at least March 20. The university’s campuses will remain open but no in-person classes will be held.

Most K-12 schools in the Seattle area have closed until further notice because of the virus as have several federal courthouses in Washington state.

Washington, Utah and four other states have declared statewide emergencies because of the coronavirus.

On Friday night Utah health officials reported that state’s first case of the virus — a man older than age 60 who apparently contracted the virus while aboard a cruise ship.

That ship, the Grand Princess, is currently circling in the waters off California after several former passengers, including the Utah man, contracted the virus. At present there are 21 people among the ship’s over 3,000 passengers and crew who’ve tested positive for the virus. Authorities are trying to find a non-commercial port in the U.S. where the Grand Princess can dock while under quarantine.

Officials in Idaho say it’s inevitable that the coronavirus will spread here, though as of Saturday there were no confirmed coronavirus cases in the Gem State.

However, four South Korean students attending Boise State University have been placed in quarantine at an apartment complex owned by the university since arriving in the U.S. from South Korea on Monday.

South Korea is one of the nations being hardest hit by the virus, which was first detected in Wuhan, China, in December 2019.

The four South Korean students in Boise have not tested positive for the virus but will remain in self-isolation at the university owned apartment complex for 14 days as a precaution, university officials said.

In East Idaho, Bingham County held an emergency meeting on Thursday to discuss coronavirus precautions for county employees and the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes issued a Friday press release outlining efforts being done at tribal-run businesses such as the Shoshone-Bannock Casino Hotel at Fort Hall to prevent the spread of the virus. The tribes’ press release also urged members of the public to take simple steps to counter the virus such as avoiding close contact with sick people, staying home if you are sick, covering your mouth and nose if you sneeze, washing your hands, and avoiding touching your eyes, nose or mouth.

The most visible coronavirus impact at present in Idaho is that many retail and grocery stores here are running out of items as Idahoans prepare for the worst.

As of Saturday, the coronavirus had infected over 200 Americans and killed 19 nationwide. About half of the 50 states have reported coronavirus cases.

Worldwide, over 100,000 people have contracted the virus and over 3,400 have died.

The World Health Organization has not yet declared coronavirus to be a pandemic, although many health experts say it has met the criteria for such a designation.

WHO officials said labeling the outbreak as a pandemic might spook the world further and lead some countries to lose hope of containing the virus.

“Unless we’re convinced it’s uncontrollable, why (would) we call it a pandemic?” WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

The WHO has previously described a pandemic as a situation in which a new virus is causing “sustained community-level outbreaks” in at least two world regions.

Many experts say that threshold has long been met: The coronavirus is now spreading freely in four regions, it has reached every continent but Antarctica, and its advance seems unavoidable. The disease has managed to gain a foothold and multiply quickly even in countries with relatively strong public health systems.

The coronavirus has already infected far more people than those sickened by SARS, MERS or Ebola in recent years.

“I think it’s pretty clear we’re in a pandemic and I don’t know why WHO is resisting that,” said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.

Health experts say the most concerning aspects of the coronavirus are that some people apparently contract it without any contact with infected individuals and that the virus has spread rapidly even in countries such as Italy and South Korea that quickly shut down all travel to and from China.

“We were the first country to stop flights to China and we were completely surprised by this disease,” said Massimo Galli, an infectious-diseases professor at the University of Milan in Italy. “It’s dangerous for the entire world that the virus is able to spread underground like this.”