New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham confirmed a new coronavirus infection that has no apparent link to travel on Wednesday, March 18, 2020, during a news conference on the floor of the state House of Representatives in Santa Fe, N.M. She also issued orders to limit the spread of the contagion by restricting restaurants to take-out service and closing down movie theaters, gyms, spas and shopping malls. New Mexico is bracing for the possible spread of coronavirus to some of America's most remote, impoverished communities, as hospitals across the state prepare to convert operating rooms into acute respiratory care units. (AP Photo/Morgan Lee)

New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham confirmed a new coronavirus infection that has no apparent link to travel on Wednesday, March 18, 2020, during a news conference on the floor of the state House of Representatives in Santa Fe, N.M. She also issued orders to limit the spread of the contagion by restricting restaurants to take-out service and closing down movie theaters, gyms, spas and shopping malls. New Mexico is bracing for the possible spread of coronavirus to some of America's most remote, impoverished communities, as hospitals across the state prepare to convert operating rooms into acute respiratory care units. (AP Photo/Morgan Lee)

SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — Eighteen residents at a retirement facility in New Mexico’s most populous city have tested positive for the coronavirus, bringing the state’s total to nearly 500 cases, officials announced Friday.

Mark DiMenna, deputy director of Albuquerque’s Environmental Health Department, confirmed the positive tests for COVID-19 two days after the first infection turned up at La Vida Llena.

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham says the infection at the assisted and independent living facility has been traced by health officials to a worker who may have transmitted the disease unwittingly before showing medical symptoms of COVID-19, which is characterized by fever, shallow breathing and other symptoms.

The governor said new testing is underway at an assisted living center in Santa Fe where one worker has tested positive for coronavirus, without naming the facility, and that surveillance was increased at a facility in Sandoval County.

New Mexico suspended public access to assisted living facilities, with exceptions for end-of-life hospice care, shortly after the first coronavirus in the state was detected in mid-March. People over the age of 60 are more vulnerable to severe effects of the contagion, according to medical experts.

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Lujan Grisham, who says she halted in-person visits to her own mother at an assisted living facility as a precaution, said during an online update Friday that a total of 495 cases have been confirmed as testing ramps up. She said 10 people have died and another 41 remain hospitalized.

Representatives for La Vida Llena had no immediate comment.

For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia and death.

New Mexico health officials and medical center executives are pushing to reinforce hospital supplies and personnel in anticipation of a surge in infected patients that will test the capacity of the health care system starting in mid-April or early May, according to current statistical modelling.

Human Services Secretary David Scrase says that surge already is underway in the northwest of the state that overlaps the Navajo Nation. McKinley and San Juan counties lead all other areas of New Mexico in terms of infections per capita.

National Guard troops have been deployed there to ferry coronavirus testing samples quickly to labs for processing and to deliver food, water and household supplies to remote rural communities, the governor said.

State health officials said that hospitals run the risk of running out of ventilators to treat acute patients. They hope to increase stocks from 265 to 1,629 by acquiring the breathing machines on the private market or adapting other equipment in case no more ventilators are forthcoming from the federal government.

In other developments:

— State workforce officials processed 28,344 new unemployment claims during the seven-day period ending Thursday. The Workforce Solutions Department says the number of people receiving unemployment benefits or awaiting a determination on eligibility has climbed to 44,000. That’s up from about 10,000 before the local coronavirus outbreak.

— A western New Mexico hotel that once hosted John Wayne and future President Ronald Reagan will use one of its buildings to house homeless patients.

The Gallup Independent reported that El Rancho Hotel agreed this week to offer its space if health care workers needed places for critical patients affected by COVID-19.

El Rancho Hotel officials said patients will be placed in a separate building across the parking lot from the central hotel. The building has enough space for up to 20 homeless people.

— The New Mexico Department of Transportation and the Archdiocese of Santa Fe on Friday urged Catholics to stay home during Holy Week and to refrain from participating in annual pilgrimages that have been canceled.