People could face prison sentences if they have symptoms of novel coronavirus pneumonia but do not report the truth when entering the country, said Wang Jun, an official from the General Administration of Customs.

He highlighted the punishment at a press conference on Monday when explaining a guideline jointly issued by five central authorities, and called for passengers to cooperate with customs to receive health checks.

Recently, some inbound passengers were found to have hidden their travels to countries or regions hit hard by the epidemic, or even had faked symptoms to pass customs by taking fever-reducing medication.

Such moves, which cause close contacts to be quarantined and brings risks to public health security, have been clarified as a "serious situation" of disturbing the frontier health and quarantine in the guideline, and violators will be punished for the crime in line with criminal law, Wang said.

Violators will be given an imprisonment of not more than three years or a detention, as well as fines for such crimes.

Wang called on passengers to receive health checks at customs, "as it's not only protection for ourselves and others around us, but also the passengers' duty".

"If someone does not do that, he or she will be blamed or even face a jail term," he added.

According to the guideline, released by the Supreme People's Court, the Supreme People's Procuratorate, the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of Justice and the customs administration on Monday, people refusing health checks or falsifying health statement cards when entering the country will be identified as committing the crime of disturbing frontier health and quarantine.

The guideline aims to prevent the epidemic by rule of law and curb the spread of the virus from customs.