The Municipal Affairs Bureau (IAM) said in a statement yesterday that as Hong Kong authorities found COVID-19 on their recent meat imports from Brazil and Poland, it also inspected imports from the same suppliers and found no abnormalities.
According to the statement, Hong Kong’s Food and Environmental Hygiene Department announced on Monday that an order of frozen beef from Brazil and pork skin from Poland had tested positive for the novel coronavirus.
The statement pointed out that the bureau immediately traced all the import records from the same suppliers and collected samples to test them, stressing that they all didn’t show any abnormalities. The statement underlined that the bureau has halted applications to import products from the two suppliers.
The statement noted that since July 2020, the bureau has been collecting samples from frozen goods imported from Brazil and Poland, and none of the products have shown any abnormalities. The statement added that in the recent three months, the bureau has followed the government’s COVID-19 prevention and control measures to disinfect, inspect and quarantine all frozen products before entering the local market.
The statement pointed out that as soon as the bureau receives reports about a product from a country of a specific supplier containing COVID-19, it immediately halts the import applications for a period of time. The statement also pointed out that the bureau has a system that can trace the imports’ storage situation and can notify retailers not to sell the products until another round of testing confirms that they are COVID-19-free.
