Guangzhou, China: The provincial capital of Guangzhou has stopped imports of frozen meat and seafood from countries with a high number of coronavirus cases, state media reported on August 16.
Over the last few weeks, Chinese authorities have reported at least 10 incidents of imported goods or their packaging testing positive for coronavirus, according to the Financial Times.
Guangdong last week launched a system for tracing imported frozen meat and seafood after a sample from refrigerated chicken wings imported from Brazil, the world’s largest exporter of frozen poultry, tested positive for the virus. The outer packaging of frozen prawns from Ecuador also tested positive.
However, the picture is mixed when it comes to any conclusive link between refrigerated foods and Covid-19. The World Health Organization stresses that there is “no evidence” of the refrigerated food trade being a risk for Covid-19 spread.
And in Singapore, Professor Ooi Eng Eong, deputy director, Duke-NUS Medical School’s emerging infectious diseases programme, told The Strait Times: “My sense is that although it is certainly possible for Sars-CoV-2 to be transmitted through improperly handled food, the risk is likely to be small.”
However, Dale Fisher, a senior consultant in the division of infectious diseases at the National University Hospital in Singapore, pointed out that the coronavirus that causes Covid-19 remains viable for at least three weeks at 4 deg C. He recently concluded a study that involved putting the Sars-CoV-2 virus on prawn, salmon and pork, and testing its viability after three weeks – an ample timeframe for such food to be exported and sold, Professor Fisher said.
Meanwhile, imported refrigerated freight is at the heart of a New Zealand probe into how newly infected people affected acquired Covid-19. Six of those infected work at coldstore, raising the possibility that they may have contracted the disease from the imported food before spreading it to others.
“We do know from studies overseas that actually, the virus can survive in some refrigerated environments for quite some time,” said Ashley Bloomfield, director-general of New Zealand Health.
Professor Teo Yik Ying, dean of the Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health in Singapore, said that while the risk to the average consumer is extremely low, it may be higher for people working in the chilled food plants handling imported products every day.
“But even for something where the chance is very small, when multiplied across the total number of chilled packages being shipped between locations, a few events will occur over time,” he said.
In the UK, an Iceland distribution centre, run by XPO Logistics, was affected when over 50 staff tested positive for coronavirus.
Meanwhile, meat factories in Wales have also been hit, with clusters of cases affecting the 2 Sisters Food Group, Rowan Foods and Kepak Merthyr.
The First Minister of Wales said that the Rowan Foods outbreak was “in any practical sense over”.
