South Korean President Moon Jae-in has declared an emergency following a rapid spike in coronavirus infections in a single day.
Following an emergency government meeting, Moon said, “The COVID-19 incident faces a grave turning point. The next few days will be crucial.” More on the report below:
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“The government will raise the alert level to the highest level of ‘grave’ according to experts’ recommendations and drastically strengthen our response system,” he added.
Promising that the government would do everything in its power in response to the COVID-19 outbreak, Moon also called for “unprecedented, powerful” measures to stop the epidemic from spreading, reported Yonhap.
This same move would institute the same types of containment measures that China has put in place.
As of Sunday, there were 3 more deaths and 169 new cases of the coronavirus in South Korea. At 602 confirmed cases, that’s double the number from Friday to Saturday. The three additional deaths put the nationwide toll at five.
Around 55 percent of the new cases were from a Christian church in Daegu, all due to a 61-year-old woman who went to church before being tested positive for the virus. The woman had not traveled overseas recently.
The woman had developed a fever on February 10 but managed to attend four services at the Shincheonji Church of Jesus before she was diagnosed.
As a result, roughly 9,300 Shincheonji members in Daegu have either been placed in quarantine or asked to stay at home, according to Jung Eun-kyeong, the director of Korea’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC).
“The crisis level of Daegu and the North Gyeongsang province is grave,” said Mayor Kwon Young-jin.
He called on all Shincheonji Church members with symptoms to get themselves tested. So far, 670 members are unaccounted for.
“Hiding is not the answer. If you hide, it could hurt your health, your family’s health, and will not help in the early cessation of the situation,” Kwon said.
With a population of 2.5 million, Daegu is South Korea’s fourth-largest city.
Complicating matters is the fact that a few members of the Shincheonji Church toured Israeli sites between February 8 and February 15. Out of that tour group, 18 were found to be infected upon their return to South Korea.
As a result, around 180 Israeli students and 19 staff members were put under a two-week quarantine after it was discovered that they had come in contact with the South Korean tour group. Israel’s health ministry also advised all those who may have come in contact with the tourists to self-quarantine themselves.
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