“Have a travel plan that does not rely on the U.S. government for assistance,” the travel advisory tells Americans who decide to go overseas or are already there.

According to several people familiar with the situation, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo approved raising the advisory from its previous status of Level 3. That earlier advisory merely encouraged Americans to reconsider travel abroad.

The State Department press office did not respond to requests for comment, but announced on Thursday that U.S. passport agencies will only accept applications from customers with life-or-death emergencies who plan to travel within 72 hours.

Current and former U.S. State Department officials, some of them with several decades of experience, said they did not recall such a travel advisory ever being issued in the past.

The highly unusual guidance came after seven weeks of steadily increasing restrictions on U.S. travel, following President Donald Trump's move to limit travel from China at the end of January.

Other countries have closed their borders and imposed further travel restrictions as the virus has spread beyond Asia to Europe and the Western Hemisphere.

There are more than 10,000 confirmed coronavirus cases in the United States, across all 50 states and Washington, D.C.

The World Health Organization on Thursday said that there are more than 191,000 confirmed cases across more than 150 countries; an unofficial tally by researchers at Johns Hopkins University pegs that number still higher.

A State Department official based overseas expressed concern about the pending advisory, saying he worried it would cause panic among Americans. The official pointed out the difficulties of finding flights under the current conditions.

The advisory acknowledged the difficult conditions, noting, for instance: “Many countries are experiencing COVID-19 outbreaks and implementing travel restrictions and mandatory quarantines, closing borders, and prohibiting non-citizens from entry with little advance notice.“

Some Americans are stranded in countries such as Guatemala, which has issued a ban on any flights coming or going, and others are having to pay dearly for what flights are left, often transiting through several countries before finding a way back home.

And the State Department has largely been absent, according to interviews with several Americans stranded abroad, who reported receiving no help from U.S. embassies.

Stephanie Marlin was in Guatemala City visiting a friend when the Guatemalan government closed down its borders, a day before her flight was scheduled to take her back to Nashville.

She said she had communicated multiple times with Delta Air Lines about her flight, which was supposed to leave on Tuesday. Delta assured her that she was “gold” and that her flight would leave as planned.