Seoul fine-tunes social distancing rules as new cases surge in spring

Last week, South Korea's health ministry said it would continue a less restrictive social distancing plan across the country for two weeks, cancelling weddings, first birthday celebrations and family gatherings. But at the current rate of new confirmed cases in South Korea, it seems that it is not enough!

South Korea reported 363 cases on Monday , including 345 community transmissions and 18 imported transmissions, bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 96,380.

South Korean health officials announced special measures on Tuesday for the spring season to curb the spread of COVID-19, abandoning earlier plans to further open the country to protect the economy.

About a month after social distancing was relaxed, signs of a new surge in confirmed COVID-19 cases are growing in and around Seoul, accounting for nearly 70% to 80% of recently confirmed patients .

Throughout last week, South Korea has counted more than 400 cases a day , putting it under the second-strictest rules for COVID-19 under the South Korean government's reopening guidelines.

Therefore, the most urgent task for the South Korean government is to reduce the incidence rate in the capital and surrounding areas . South Korean Prime Minister Chung Sek-kyun ordered a high-level government meeting on the response to the new crown pneumonia on Tuesday, requiring the number of daily infections to be reduced to below 200 in the next two weeks .

In response, the Ministry of Tourism will strengthen supervision of tourist destinations and other places such as theme parks, shopping malls and flea markets, which are usually popular in spring. This also means that the sales of domestic tourism and spring tour products in South Korea will be affected to a certain extent.

Seoul residents picnic at a park on Yeouido Island in central Seoul on a weekend in March. Photo credit: Yonhap News Agency

" Places with the most violations of safety protocols will be subject to random on-site inspections, and an electronic system for collecting contact information at businesses and other public places will be expanded. Authorities will encourage more testing in workplaces prone to outbreaks, such as call centers, " Son Young- rae, a spokesman for South Korea's Ministry of Health and Welfare , told a news conference .

In addition to epidemic prevention measures, South Korean officials also said they would provide COVID-19 vaccines to 12 million people in the country by July.

According to official statistics, as of 24:00 yesterday , 602,150 people had received the new crown vaccine in South Korea, of which more than 95% (or 575,289) were vaccinated with AstraZeneca's vaccine and the rest were vaccinated with Pfizer's vaccine.

COVID-19

South Korea

spring