60 Long-Term Care Hospitals in 4 Areas Including Suwon and Bucheon Tested 7,781 People... All Negative

[Asia Economy (Suwon) = Reporter Lee Young-gyu] Gyeonggi Province conducted a sample COVID-19 diagnostic test on employees, caregivers, and newly admitted patients at 60 nursing hospitals in four regions?Suwon, Bucheon, Pyeongtaek, and Pocheon?from the 18th to the 28th of last month, with all results coming back negative.

This test was carried out in response to the ongoing sporadic cluster infections within the community at hospitals, churches, clubs, and other locations following the Itaewon club-related outbreak, aiming to proactively address the risk of cluster infections in nursing hospitals, which have a high-risk patient population.

The test was conducted on a sample of 7,781 individuals, including employees, caregivers, and newly admitted patients within the last two weeks, across all 60 nursing hospitals in four cities?Suwon, Bucheon, Pyeongtaek, and Pocheon?among the seven cities in the province where cluster infections occurred. The testing applied a specimen pooling method.

Pooling tests are primarily for asymptomatic individuals and differ from the conventional method of testing one specimen per person by mixing specimens from 5 to 10 people for testing.

Only when the mixed specimen tests positive is the entire batch retested. If negative, no retesting is required, making the diagnostic process approximately 50% faster on average compared to individual testing.

Among the seven cities, 3 cities?Seongnam, Uijeongbu, and Gunpo?excluding the four cities of Suwon and Bucheon, conducted priority testing in April on 3,979 individuals from all 30 nursing hospitals according to the Ministry of Health and Welfare’s plan, with all results also testing negative.

Gyeonggi Province will continue on-site inspections through daily reports from nursing hospitals and plans to support the budget for pooling tests for companies intending to conduct random sample testing to enable early detection of infection sources and prevent further spread.

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