YEREVAN, JANUARY 29, ARMENPRESS. There are no laboratory tests yet for diagnosing new type of coronavirus in Armenia and the region in general. However, if any suspected case is detected, Armenia will send samples to the partnering laboratories of Europe, head of Department of Epidemiology of Special Dangerous and Airborne diseases at the Healthcare Ministry Liana Torosyan said during today’s press conference, adding that there hasn’t been such a necessity yet.

“Armenia is not considered a risky country in this respect. But we have the whole laboratory capacities to diagnose the atypical pneumonia due to a novel coronavirus and the Middle East respiratory syndrome also conditioned by coronavirus. As for the new coronavirus, this is not available for some countries yet. If a case is detected, we can send the sample to the limited number of laboratories in partnership with the World Health Organization (WHO), which have the opportunity to diagnose it”, she said, adding that there are three such laboratories in the European region where the sample can be tested.

She added that a targeted examination is needed. Liana Torosyan said the new coronavirus doesn’t have any extraordinary symptom, mainly the existence of pneumonia hints the specialists about the possibility of coronavirus.

Torosyan said Armenia’s healthcare ministry is closely cooperating with a number of structures and is holding discussions on the topic. Based on the results of the discussions held with the Food Safety Inspectorate a decision was made to ban the import of goods from China to Armenia starting from January 26. The foreign ministry together with the tourism committee has developed a memo which suggests the citizens of Armenia to avoid organizing tourism visits from China to Armenia for the upcoming two months.

The specialists of the healthcare ministry visited the border checkpoints of Armenia to provide professional support to the representatives of the Healthcare and Labor Inspectorate.

According to the latest data published by the World Health Organization, number of people infected with new coronavirus reached 4357, and the number of those killed is 106. But according to the information of the Chinese healthcare authorities, nearly 5997 cases were detected, and the death toll reached 132. Cases were also detected in 15 other countries.

Edited and translated by Aneta Harutyunyan