This handout picture taken and released by the World Health Organization on Oct 5, 2020 shows World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus wearing a protective face mask delivering a speech on a TV screen during a WHO executive board special session on the COVID-19 response at the health agency's headquarters in Geneva. (CHRISTOPHER BLACK/WORLD HEALTH ORIGANIZATION/AFP) Christopher Black / World Health Organization / AFP

GENEVA - A team of international experts led by the World Health Organization had their first virtual meeting with their Chinese counterparts as part of the WHO-led mission to identify the zoonotic origin of COVID-19.

READ MORE: WHO experts to go to China to identify virus' zoonotic source

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus made the remarks in a press conference on Friday, during which he also said the WHO emergency committee had unanimously agreed that the pandemic still constituted a public health emergency of international concern.

The virtual meeting has helped the international team of experts and their Chinese colleagues to familiarize with each other and exchange information on what has been achieved so far in identifying the animal source of COVID-19

Tedros called on countries to avoid politicization of the pandemic response, which is seen as detrimental to global efforts. 

According to Mike Ryan, executive director of the WHO's Health Emergencies Program, the virtual meeting helped the international team of experts and their Chinese colleagues to familiarize with each other and exchange information on what has been achieved so far in identifying the animal source of COVID-19.

He emphasized that scientists need the best answers to the origin, "not just any answer that satisfies political needs of speed and investigation."

Ryan warned that it was difficult to do scientific work on the virus origin in a “politically intoxicated” environment.

“We are scientists. We want the best possible scientific outcome generating the best possible evidence for the origin of this disease,” he said.

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His remarks suggested that finding the animal source of COVID-19 may take quite a while just as previous investigations on the animal sources of MERS and SARS.