Community transmission of the new coronavirus is "inevitable," New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Monday, a day after the state confirmed its first case.

A woman in New York City is the first COVID-19 infection in the state, health officials said Sunday. More than 80 cases have been confirmed in the United States, including the first two deaths, which were reported this weekend near Seattle.

The woman, in her late 30s, is a health worker who returned from Iran on Tuesday and is currently isolated in her home in New York City, officials said. Cuomo said the woman was tested at Mount Sinai Hospital.

"We will have community spread," Cuomo told reporters at a news briefing alongside New York Mayor Bill de Blasio. "That is inevitable."

Cuomo said the new patient wasn't symptomatic when she landed, and she only recently developed respiratory symptoms associated with COVID-19. As a result, he said, he doesn't believe the woman was contagious when she arrived in New York and took a private car to her home — even though U.S. and world health officials say the disease can spread before symptoms show.

Officials didn't specify the airport or say which New York borough she lives in. They did say her husband, also a health-care worker, was tested for the virus and they expect him to be positive as well.

State health officials are reaching out to the other passengers on the plane as well as the driver of the car she took home from the airport, Cuomo said.