The Chinese city of Wuhan first reported cases of COVID-19 last year and Beijing has continued to deny it originated in the country despite reports it passed from animal to humans in an exotic meat market. But now Beijing have now hit out as international food imports for coronavirus.
According to the Times, around 23 companies have been barred from the Communist nation after a packet of frozen shrimp from Ecuador was carrying the virus.
Last week, Bi Kevin, director of food safety at China’s General Administration of Customs, said they tested more than 200,000 samples of imported food.
Of those tested, six shrimp products from Ecuador tested positive.
He said: “With the epidemic developing rapidly overseas, especially after some countries resumed work despite the virus, the risks have increased for the cold chain to be contaminated.”
China blames British food for coronavirus (Image: Getty)
Shrimp imports test positive for coronavirus (Image: Getty)
Now, Tulip, a British pork producer, has suspended shipments voluntarily after employees tested positive for the virus.
Other companies from the US, Brazil and Germany have also been sanctioned.
China has denied starting the virus and even claim it did not originate in the Communist nation but instead was brought over from Europeans.
However, China is currently witnessing a rise of cases and last month was forced to place Beijing back into lockdown after traces of the virus were found.
READ MORE: China accused of ‘propaganda’ and ‘disinformation’ over COVID
Shrimps from Ecuador test positive for COVID-19 (Image: Getty)
The Xinfadi food market in Beijing was thought to be the source of the outbreak.
China halted its imports of salmon over fears of its links to coronavirus exposure.
Genetic traces of the virus from Xinfadi market have suggested that the resurgent outbreak may have come from Europe.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) is currently investigating the outbreak in China but is only looking at the zoonotic source.
DON’T MISS
WHO refuse to probe China’s virus lab blamed for 500,000 DEATHS [REVEAL]
Trump adviser lashes out at China in angry tirade for ‘targeting’ US [OPINION]
China starts building coronavirus vaccine plant [INSIGHT]
Coronavirus cases around the world (Image: Express)
However, an investigation found scientists from the Institute of Virology in Wuhan had analysed a potentially deadly coronavirus after traces were found in an abandoned copper mine in 2013.
Six workers were called into clear bat faeces but all fell ill with a mysterious repository disease. Three of the died.
The WHO has been criticised for accepting China’s preferred theory the virus passed naturally from animals to humans in the exotic meat market.
Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers University in New Jersey, said this week: “An inquiry that presupposes without evidence that the virus entered humans through a natural zoonotic spillover and that fails to address the alternative possibility that the virus entered humans through a laboratory accident, will have no credibility.
Wuhan in China reported first cases of COVID-19 (Image: Getty)
“To have any credibility and any value, an investigation must address the possibility that the virus entered humans through a laboratory accident and must also address the further possibility that the ability of the virus to infect humans was enhanced through laboratory manipulation.”
Accusations China deliberately set out to spread the deadly virus were raised during the early stages of the pandemic.
US President Donald Trump blamed Beijing and lashed out at the WHO for being “China-centric” and criticised their handling of the pandemic.
Mr Trump said: “The World Health Organisation has been a disaster. Everything they said was wrong and they’re China-centric.
China also banned salmon imports (Image: Getty)
“All they do is agree with China, whatever China wants to do. So our country, perhaps foolishly in retrospect has been paying $450million a year to the World Health Organisation and China’s been paying $38million a year but they were more political than all of our leaders previously.
“What they did, what World Health did, was they missed every single call and we’re not going to put up with it.”
Mr Trump, who has been heavily criticised for the staggering death toll in the US, condemned the Communist nation for not alerting global leaders of the severity of the virus.