Casualty should decrease further before no mask is required outdoors

As the number of new COVID-19 patients has recently shown a clear downward trend across South Korea, quarantine authorities consider setting up vaccination plans to prepare citizens against any possible wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in fall and winter.

As of midnight on Tuesday, the number of newly confirmed cases was 266,135 according to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency, down by up to 90,000 from 347,490 one week ago or down 353,891 two weeks ago.

Despite the reduction of newly confirmed cases following the peak, some experts still warn that it is too early to say that the nation is completely on the safe side from the COVID-19 pandemic overall. Quarantine authorities also issued the highest alert level of “Very High” given the recent one week’s trends. Medical response systems are still burdened with too many serious conditions in hospital in the non-capital area where more than 70% of hospital beds exclusive to critical patients are already occupied.

“The number of critical conditions and deaths still remains high,” said Professor Kim Woo-joo of the Department of Infectious Diseases at Korea University Guro Hospital. “The nation has a long way to go toward dropping social distancing measures completely.”


ksy@donga.com