4th COVID-19 vaccination program to include those of 50 and above

Staring from next Monday, South Korean citizens in their 50s and above and those of 18 and above with underlying diseases such as diabetes will be eligible for the 4th COVID-19 vaccination program. The new plan will cover a wider range of citizens than the currently limited group of those in their 60s and above, those with a weak immune system including cancer patients and residents in facilities fragile to mass infection. Meanwhile, quarantine authorities plan to keep the current mandate in place for COVID-19 patients to stay in self-quarantine for seven days for some time until another wave of COVID-19 calms down.

South Korean Prime Minister Han Duck-soo released a new counteractive plan to respond to the next waves of the COVID-19 pandemic in a Central Disaster Management Headquarters meeting held on Thursday in Government Complex-Seoul. He said that the 4th jab can prevent the disease from worsening even after infection.

The government has not recovered any social distancing restrictions that apply across the nation such as limited operating hours, group size limits and mandatory outdoor mask-wearing on the grounds that fatality rates, a ratio of COVID-19 patients who end up dying, decreased to 0.07 percent as of May with the medical system fully ready to respond. Peck Kyong-ran, the commissioner of the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency, said, “The end goal is to raise public awareness of autonomous disease prevention to keep things normal with disease control in place.

As of midnight on Thursday, the daily number of newly confirmed cases was 40,266, exceeding the threshold of 40,000 cases in 63 days and showing an increase by 2.1 times compared to last Wednesday (19,371). The number of patients from overseas turned out to be 398, the second highest level following January 14 with 406 cases.


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