Chinese authorities have said that they found the coronavirus on the packaging of imported squid, urging anyone who may have bought the product to get themselves tested for the contagion.
One of the packages that had arrived in the city of Fuyu in China's northeastern Jilin province from Russia tested positive for the disease, local health authorities said on Sunday.
Officials asked people who had bought and eaten imported squid at the local Sanjia Deda frozen seafood wholesale shop between August 24 to 31 to report to their local communities and receive a COVID-19 test.
The Changchun COVID-19 prevention office said the squid had been imported from Russia by a company in Hunchun city and brought to the provincial capital.
Chinese customs said on Friday they would suspend imports from companies for a week if frozen food products tested positive for coronavirus and for a month if a supplier's products tested positive for a third time or more.
The news comes after China has suspended an Indonesian supplier last week after claiming to have found the virus on the packaging of frozen beltfish, the customs office said.
In August, local authorities in two Chinese cities said they had found traces of the virus on cargoes of imported frozen food.
The World Health Organization said then it saw no evidence of COVID-19 being spread by food or packaging.
Mainland China has recently reported very few infections with the virus which emerged in Wuhan late last year, with just 10 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday.
It says most recent cases come from people entering China from elsewhere.
This article has been adapted from its original source.
