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SEOUL (REUTERS) – South Korea reported more than 500 new coronavirus cases for the second day in a row on Friday (Nov. 27), a level not seen in nearly nine months, as a third wave of infections swept across the country and authorities rushed to provide more hospital beds.
“The situation is extremely serious and acute as all 17 metropolitan cities and provinces and especially the 25 districts of Seoul are reporting new cases,” Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun said at a meeting on Covid-19 responses.
The daily count of 569 came a day after the numbers reached the highest level since March 6, when South Korea was recovering from the first major Covid-19 epidemic outside of China.
Of the latest cases, 525 were transmitted domestically and more than 64 percent of them were from the Seoul metropolitan area, according to the Korea Agency for Disease Prevention and Control.
The authorities said the new wave is more difficult to track and contain than the first outbreaks that were concentrated in a specific region or among a certain religious group.
Alarmed by the spread across the country and the growing number of cases involving younger patients, Chung warned that daily infections could rise to 1,000 and there could be a shortage of hospital beds unless the contagion is controlled.
The Health Ministry said there are enough beds available for now, but it could face deficits if the current peak continues for more than two weeks.
The government reimposed strict social distancing rules in the capital Seoul and surrounding regions this week, restricting dinners, religious services and evening entertainment.
The move came just a month after similar restrictions were eased as a second wave of infections waned.
Previous waves quickly depleted hospital facilities, and the number of remaining beds for critical cases in the Seoul metropolitan area, a metropolis of 26 million people, once fell to nearly single digits.
In September, South Korea had around 500 intensive care beds for its 52 million people. The government promised to double the number by next year, including more than 110 this year.
The ratio is close to the average for Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries, but in previous waves of infection, many of these beds were used by less severe cases or patients with other ailments.
South Korea has reported total infections of 32,887, with 516 deaths.
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