The World Health Organisation still wants to find out whether there were small COVID-19 outbreaks in China before the first known cases in Wuhan in December 2019, virologist Marion Koopmans says.
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The Dutch scientist was part of the WHO-led team that returned from Wuhan this week after a mission to search for the origins of the coronavirus that causes the COVID-19 disease.
The WHO mission did not find conclusive evidence of cases before December 2019.
However, a broad review in Chinese disease statistics turned up 92 patients who fell ill before the known outbreak with COVID-type symptoms, Koopmans told an online WHO press briefing on Friday.
Recent blood tests among these patients did not show any virus antibodies but this might be due to the long time that has passed.
Samples from 2019 that were stored in Chinese blood banks could yield answers, Koopmans said.
"There is discussion ongoing in China to be able to access those," she said.
The WHO-led mission, which included scientists from China and 10 other countries, has not determined which animals first passed on the virus to humans.
Bats and pangolins have been identified as potential sources.
One year after the virus started spreading across many countries, infections are decreasing.
Although global COVID-19 case numbers have fallen for four weeks in a row, the world must not let its guard down, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told the briefing.
"Now is not the time for any country to relax measures," he said in Geneva.
"We should all be encouraged but complacency is as dangerous as the virus itself."
The WHO counted 3.1 million new COVID-19 cases last week, down from a peak of about five million in the first week of this year.
The weekly death toll peaked about 100,000 in the middle of January. It stood at 88,000 last week.
Australian Associated Press
