SEOUL, South Korea (AP) – COVID-19 cases have seen their biggest daily surge in 70 days since the government began penalizing people for failing to wear masks in public.
On Friday 191 new cases were filed on the sixth day over 100 and Sept. There was a daily increase after 4, while officials reported 198 new infections.
More than 120 of these cases were in the Seoul metropolitan area, where coronaviruses spread to hospitals, nursing homes, churches, schools, restaurants and offices.
The continued spread is worrying government officials, who have eased social distance measures to soften the impact of the epidemic on the economy.
While this has allowed the reopening of high-risk sites such as nightclubs and karaoke bears, Prime Minister Chung Si-qun said the spread forced the government to seriously consider tightening social gaps again.
“We are in a very precarious situation,” he said, urging awareness and labor unions and civic groups to cancel planned rallies.
South Korea has so far erupted without a major lockdown, relying on an aggressive testing and quarantine program and a relatively widespread use of masks.
On Friday, authorities began imposing fines of up to 100,000 vans ($ 90) on people who fail to wear masks on public transport and other places, including hospitals, nursing homes, pharmacies, nightclubs, karaoke bars, religious and sports facilities.
In Seoul, city personnel were deployed at subway stations and bus stops to monitor passengers.
Other developments in the Asia-Pacific region include:
– With government-run hospitals in New Delhi having COVID-19 beds, the local government decided to ask 33 out of 115 private hospitals in the capital to reserve 80% of intensive care beds for coronavirus patients. While India’s national average has stabilized recently, the virus is on the rise in the capital. New Delhi recorded 104 deaths in the last 24 hours, the highest in mid-June and 7,053 new infections on Friday. The health ministry has registered 44,879 new cases and 547 deaths across the country. There are 7.7 million cases and 12 deaths in India. Due to this boom in New Delhi, people ignore the norms of crowds and social distance in the field of shopping during the festive season.. The important Hindu festival of Diwali is celebrated on Saturday.
– Residents of Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia, have been asked to stay at home as part of a nationwide lockdown from Tuesday following an investigation into a new coronavirus case. 1.4 million city residents will be given leave for essential tasks such as shopping for groceries and medicines, the Montesum news agency said. The report states that social distance measures should always be maintained when leaving home and that hospital staff and other essential facilities must be identified when traveling. Police and military personnel were deployed to ensure compliance, it said. Ulaanbaatar confirmed two cases of community transmission on November 9 and one in the outlying area on Thursday. Since then, six other relatives or others who came into close contact with infected people have also tested positive for Covid-19. Mongolia, a large but sparsely populated country between China and Russia, has more than 40,000 confirmed cases. No one from COVID-19 died in Mongolia.
– Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga raises concerns about coronavirus infections and urges authorities to continue testing and tracing. The country set a record for new infections on Friday, with the health ministry registering 1,649 new cases, bringing the total to 113,298. Suga said the current situation does not immediately require any other emergency situation or reduction of domestic tourism. He urged people to stick to basic preventive measures such as wearing a mask and avoid talking loudly or joining drinking parties that increase the risk of airborne leaks.
– The New Zealand government may soon make it mandatory to wear masks on public transport and on nationwide flights in Caledonia as it continues to investigate new community cases of coronavirus. Virus response minister Chris Hipkins says there are no plans to raise the country’s alert level after linking a recent case with a military worker who caught the virus at a hotel used as a quarantine site by genome testing. Hipkins says he will recommend a mask order before the cabinet for its approval on Monday. New Zealand has been largely successful in its efforts to stem the spread of the virus.
– The Chinese government says it has helped more than 70,000 Chinese return from 92 foreign countries, between the onset of the coronavirus epidemic and between November 10. Most of the country’s cases reported in recent months were imported, and Deputy Foreign Minister Luo Zhaoi said the number of infections detected at entry ports had risen by about 45% since September. Most recently, China suspended five international flights after a significant number of COVID-19 victims were reported among passengers. Of the total 86,307 cases reported in China since the coronavirus was found late last year in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, about 3,600 have been imported. Only eight new cases were reported by the National Health Commission on Friday, all of which were imported. A total of 4,634 deaths from COVID-19 have been reported in China, which has been largely stable for months.
– Calls from several Indonesian parties to postpone the regional elections on December 9 are starting as new coronavirus infections reach record levels. Officials on Friday registered 4,444 new cases, bringing the country’s confirmed total to 45,457,735, the highest number in Southeast Asia and the second highest in Asia at 7.7 million confirmed cases in India. The election is expected to elect nine governors, 37 mayors and 224 district presidents. Indonesia’s two largest Islamic groups, Nahdatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah, have called for a postponement of the polls, citing a number of election observers, activists and health experts citing election risks. The government believes the election should go ahead “because no country can predict the end of the epidemic,” presidential spokesman Fadjroel Rachman said Friday. “President Joko Widodo has stressed that regional elections should be held under strict health protocols to ensure they are safe and democratic.” The coronavirus has killed 15,037 people in Indonesia.
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