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Russian watchdog’s research center included in registry of labs detecting coronavirus

The WHO has officially included Rospotrebnadzor’s State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology VECTOR in the registry of European laboratories providing assistance to the WHO in diagnosing the disease

© Donat Sorokin/TASS

MOSCOW, January 28. /TASS/. A research center of the Russian Federal Service for Supervision of Consumer Rights Protection and Human Well-Being (Rospotrebnadzor) has been included in the registry of European laboratories providing assistance to the World Health Organization in detecting novel coronavirus, the watchdog said on its website.

"The WHO has officially included Rospotrebnadzor’s State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology VECTOR, which has developed two modern test systems for detecting novel coronavirus, in the registry of European laboratories providing assistance to the WHO in diagnosing the disease," the statement said.

On December 31, 2019, Chinese authorities informed the World Health Organization about an outbreak of an unknown pneumonia in the city of Wuhan, a large trade and industrial center in central China populated by 11 million people. On January 7, 2020, Chinese experts identified the infecting agent as coronavirus 2019-nCoV.

The new strain of coronavirus has already been identified in almost all Chinese provinces including Beijing and Shanghai as well as in other countries such as Australia, Malaysia, Nepal, France, Thailand, Vietnam, Germany, South Korea, Singapore, the United States and Japan. The WHO recognized the pneumonia outbreak in China as a national emergency but stopped short of declaring it an international one.

According to the latest data, a total of 106 Chinese citizens have died of novel coronavirus and 4,515 others have been infected, Xinhua reported citing the Chinese authorities.

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