Living coronavirus found on frozen food packaging for the first time in China

China has confirmed the detection and isolation of living novel coronavirus on the outer packaging of imported frozen marine fish in the port city of Qingdao. The country's health authority described this as the first detection of its kind on the cold food chain in the world.

The Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Saturday said it detected and isolated the living novel coronavirus on the outer packaging of imported frozen cod(large marine fish) in Qingdao.

No new clusters of cases were, however, found after the tests conducted on about 11 million population of Qingdao, where a new cluster of COVID-19 cases were reported recently.

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The finding was made during an investigation to trace the source of recent infections reported in the city. It has proved that contact with packaging contaminated by living novel coronavirus could lead to infection.

It is the first time in the world that living novel coronavirus has been isolated from the outer packaging of cold-chain food, the statement said.

Xinhua news agency said the risk of cold-chain food circulating in China's market being contaminated by the novel coronavirus is very low, citing recent nucleic acid test results for samples taken from the business.

A total of 2.98 million samples had been tested across the country's 24 provincial-level regions by September 15, including 670,000 taken from cold-chain food or food packaging, 1.24 million from working staff and 1.07 million from the environment.

Only 22 samples from cold-chain food or food packaging tested positive for the virus, the CDC said.

In July, China suspended imports of frozen shrimp after the deadly virus was found on packages and the inner wall of a container.