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After much speculation about the new outbreak in Beijing, we already know from genome sequencing that it is a European strain . The details, based on three samples, two human and one environmental, collected on June 11, the same day the first infection was reported, were published last night on the website of the China National Center for Microbiology Data.

"According to the preliminary results of the genomic and epidemiological study, the virus is from Europe, but it is older than the virus that is currently spreading in Europe," said Zhang Yong, deputy director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention ( CDC) . "It could have been hidden in imported frozen products, or it was lurking in a dark and humid environment without disinfecting like the Xinfadi market," added Zhang. The agency's director, Gao Fu, pointed out a couple of days ago that this outbreak probably did not date from the beginning of June or the end of May as previously thought, but probably a month earlier.

Nextstrain, an international mapping project that tracks SARS-CoV-2 varieties as they spread, also classified the strain found in Xinfadi as similar to the new coronaviruses found in Europe. From Nextstrain they added that, when compared to other viral strains worldwide in a higher level of abstraction, the "closest sequences" are from the Czech Republic, Greece and Portugal .

Today in Beijing 25 new infections have been reported of the 32 new cases across the country . In total, since last Thursday, 184 new infections have been confirmed in the capital of among the more than 400,000 nucleic acid tests that have been carried out on residents. The spread rate appears to have slowed since last weekend, when around 40 infections were found each day, prompting authorities to block city districts and impose travel restrictions.

Yesterday, Wu Zunyou, chief epidemiologist for the CDC, claimed that the new coronavirus outbreak was under control. "In the coming days we will continue to see new confirmed cases, but the transmission of the virus is under control, with which the curve will gradually flatten," he explained. Wu clarified that even so, Beijing should only relax the restrictions after failing to report new cases for two consecutive weeks .

Since the outbreak broke out in Xinfadi, the city's largest food market, virologists have visited the market three times for their investigations. Wu Zunyou has explained these days that a large number of infections had erupted among merchants selling seafood, beef, and lamb. More than 200 samples were collected in the underground section where seafood and meat are sold .

Contaminated samples

Chinese authorities have reported that many of the samples are contaminated with the coronavirus and suspect that the low temperature and high humidity in the area may have been contributing factors in a new outbreak. China has halted imports from European salmon suppliers this week amid fears they could be linked to the recent outbreak in Beijing. Virologists also collected samples two kilometers from the market, giving the same positive results.

Liu Jun, a researcher at the National Institute for Disease Control and Prevention, who also participated in the virus search work in Wuhan, said there is now some speculation about how the virus got to Beijing . "Fish products may have caused the latest outbreak after being transported to the market through the cold chain. Another possibility is that an infected person enters the market and then transmits the virus to others," Liu said.

"If an individual infected with Covid-19 sneezes, the drops can fall to the ground and contaminate other areas," added the researcher. "But we cannot conclude that the wet market was the source of the virus just because an outbreak occurred there. This gives us an opportunity to re-examine our previous speculation that the virus originated in wildlife , because unlike the wet market in Wuhan, the chance of wildlife causing the latest outbreak in Beijing is slim. "

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