PanARMENIAN.Net – 12 passengers who were hospitalized from Armenia's Zvartnots airport tested negative for the coronavirus, a spokeswoman for the Ministry of Health revealed in a Facebook post on Friday, February 7.

Alina Nikoghosyan's comments came in response to media publications suggesting that "more than 10 citizens arrived from China with a high temperature and were immediately hospitalized."

"Twenty tests were performed overall, all with a negative result," Nikoghosyan said.

The death toll from the virus was at least 638 as of Thursday evening. All but two of the deaths were in mainland China, with one person succumbing in the Philippines and another in Hong Kong. More than 31,000 people have been infected with the virus worldwide, the vast majority of them in China.