Update: As of 12 p.m. Thursday, March 12, test results show that one Mainer has tested presumptive positive for the coronavirus. Click here for the latest coronavirus news, which the BDN has made free for the public. You can support this mission by purchasing a digital subscription.
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As of noon Wednesday, there have been no confirmed cases of the new coronavirus in Maine, based on 42 tests, according to the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Health officials still await results from another five tests.
Click here for the latest coronavirus news, which the BDN has made free for the public. You can support this mission by purchasing a digital subscription.
Here are the latest developments on the coronavirus, known as COVID-19, and its impact in Maine so far:
— The World Health Organization on Wednesday declared the coronavirus a global pandemic, and the Trump administration unveiled a travel ban on non-citizens from continental Europe that takes effect midnight Friday.
— That caused yet another day of tumbling in the stock market, with the Dow Jones Industrial Index falling almost 6 percent and the S&P 500 within 1 percentage point of bear market territory.
— On Wednesday morning, Bowdoin President Clayton Rose announced that students will not be permitted to return to the Brunswick campus after spring break and that any students who remained on campus during the break period need to vacate their dorms by 5 p.m. March 18. Classes will resume remotely on March 25.
— Later on Wednesday, the University of Maine System announced that students on its seven campuses also will attend classes remotely following spring break. That marked a sudden change of course for the University of Maine, where administrators on Tuesday offered to open dorms and dining halls so students could remain on the Orono campus during the upcoming spring break.
— So far, Bates College in Lewiston will continue to hold classes in person; the college has no break coming up between now and when the winter semester ends, on April 18.
Watch: What you need to know about handwashing during coronavirus
— Cancellations hit the Maine sports world on Wednesday, when Colby, Bowdoin and Bates canceled their spring sports season, per a mandate from the New England Small College Athletic Conference. Special Olympics Maine also suspended all of its scheduled sport training and competition.
— President Donald Trump signed into law last week a massive package to aid the fight against the coronavirus. On Wednesday, Maine learned its share of the nearly $8 billion package was $4.5 million.
— Maine is, at this time, the only New England state where no coronavirus cases have been reported. Vermont reported its second confirmed case on Wednesday, while there have been at least 92 reported in Massachusetts, five in New Hampshire, three in Rhode Island and two in Connecticut.
— Nationally, at least 938 people have been sickened by the coronavirus in 38 states and the District of Columbia, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The coronavirus has caused at least 29 deaths as of Wednesday.
— Actor Tom Hanks and his wife, singer Rita Wilson, have tested positive for the coronavirus after a trip to Australia, Hanks said Wednesday.