Chinese health officials are calling for more search for the COVID-19 origin sources outside of China, a day after the publication of a WHO report on the matter, AP reported.

Experts agreed that the location where the first case was detected is not necessarily the location of the virus.

The WHO report concluded that the virus, or its predecessor, was most likely carried by a bat that infected another animal that had infected a person. Researchers have not yet been able to track down a bat or intermediate animal, but the suspicion has fallen to the habitat of bats in southwestern China or neighboring Southeast Asia.

Bats carrying a virus similar to that caused by COVID-19 have been found in China's Yunnan province, but Chinese experts noted that such viruses have also been found in Southeast Asia. The same is true for pangolins, another mammal that is considered a possible carrier.