"What Did You Do for Three Days?" Full Effort to Trace Secondary Infection Routes and Contacts

Patient 3 Ate Meat with Patient 6 After Taking Fever Medicine
Restaurant Added Late... Three Days of Community Exposure

Concerns of 3rd Infection... Met Daycare Teacher's Daughter During Holiday

An official from Incheon International Airport is showing a health status questionnaire to arrivals from Shanghai, China, at Incheon International Airport on the 28th. Starting from this day, health authorities have mandated the submission of a 'health status questionnaire' from all entrants coming from China to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus infection.
Yeongjongdo - Photo by Hyunmin Kim kimhyun81@

[Asia Economy Reporter Cho Hyun-ui] The second domestic secondary infection case of the novel coronavirus infection (Wuhan pneumonia) is a high school classmate who had a meal with the third patient for nearly an hour and a half. The restaurant where the infection occurred was disclosed late due to the third patient's contradictory statements, exposing the limitations of the quarantine system that relies on testimonies. Health authorities are making every effort to trace contacts by identifying the movements of the secondary infected person.

According to the Central Disease Control Headquarters on the 31st, the sixth patient is a 56-year-old Korean man who had a meal with the third patient at a Korean restaurant called 'Hanilgwan' located in Gangnam-gu, Seoul, on the 22nd. On the same day at 5:52 PM, the patient sat at a 90cm by 90cm table on the 5th floor of Hanilgwan with the third patient and another man in his 50s, eating bulgogi. It appears the infection occurred through saliva-contaminated spoons or food or during conversation. Generally, when coughing, saliva droplets can spread up to 2 meters forward.

◆ Additional Infection Confirmed by Changed Statement= Hanilgwan was added as a location after the third patient advanced the symptom onset time by six hours. Earlier, on the 29th, health authorities added two more places visited by the third patient. During an in-depth epidemiological investigation, when asked "When did respiratory symptoms start?" the patient changed his statement from "evening" to "lunch." Accordingly, the authorities changed the symptom onset time from 7 PM to 1 PM on the 22nd and increased the number of contacts from 74 to 95.

The third patient felt fever and body aches on the day he met the sixth patient, took antipyretics, and then went to the evening venue. The third patient, who entered from Wuhan, China on the 20th, visited Gangnam and Ilsan areas in Seoul for five days until the 24th. In a recent interview with the media, he claimed, "I did not know I was infected because I had no fever or cough, and I wore a mask to prevent transmission."

◆ Full Effort to Trace Contacts of Secondary Infection= What health authorities are concerned about is that the sixth patient, who was out of the quarantine net for three days, could cause another infection. The sixth patient was mistakenly classified as a casual contact on the 26th, changed to a close contact on the 29th, and quarantined on the 31st. Close contacts are self-quarantined, while casual contacts are not restricted in their movements.

The fifth patient, who was confirmed positive the day before along with the sixth patient, was also exposed to the community for at least three days after returning from Wuhan. This patient, who visited Wuhan for work and returned on the 24th, reported symptoms such as cough and sputum to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency call center 1339 on the 27th. Afterward, he was confirmed positive the day before and isolated at Seoul Medical Center. With holes in the community quarantine net, health authorities are on alert. When the sixth and third patients had a meal on the 22nd, there were customers at eight surrounding tables.

Concerns about tertiary infections are also growing. The sixth patient reportedly met with his daughter and her husband, who live in Chungnam, at his home in Seoul during the recent Lunar New Year holiday. The daughter is a teacher at a daycare center in Taean-gun, and the son-in-law is known to have a job involving contact with many people, so the possibility of further infections through them cannot be ruled out. The Central Disease Control Headquarters stated, "The immediate response team is currently conducting an epidemiological investigation," and "additional information will be disclosed once the investigation is completed."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.