WASHINGTON 

The U.S. announced Wednesday it is suspending routine visa services in "most countries" as the international community seeks to halt the spread of the new coronavirus.

"Routine visa services will resume ASAP but we are unable to provide a specific date at this time," the State Department's Bureau of Consular Affairs said on Twitter.

It referred individuals to look at the websites for the U.S.'s embassies and consulates in individual countries to see if they are part of the temporary visa suspension.

The visa section on the U.S. Embassy in Ankara's website did not explicitly state whether services had been affected.

The announcement comes as the number of coronavirus infections worldwide has surpassed 212,000, including over 8,000 deaths, according to a tally compiled by Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.

That includes over 7,300 cases in the U.S. where 115 deaths have been counted.