A Chinese health official working with the team of World Health Organization experts in Wuhan said that the Huanan seafood market may not be the first place of the Covid-19 outbreak.

“Huanan market may not be the first place that had the outbreak,” Liang Wannian, head of Expert Panel of COVID-19 Response of China's National Health Commission (NHC) said in a joint press conference with WHO experts in Wuhan on Tuesday.

Liang noted that the onset date of the earliest Covid-19 case had been on December 8, 2019, and the earliest case associated with Huanan market was on December 12, 2019.

He said that “the case with the onset date of December 8 case had no relation with Huanan seafood market,” but did not indicate a location that the December 8 case was connected to.

Earlier, World Health Organization expert Peter Ben Embarek said that the team investigating the origins of the coronavirus in Wuhan had identified two scenarios that most likely caused the transmission of Covid-19 to humans.

“Our initial findings suggest that the introduction through an intermediary host species is the most likely pathway and one way that will require more studies and more specific targeted research,” Embarek said during a press conference on Tuesday.

He added that the possibility of transmission through the trade of frozen products was also likely.