Seoul City Changes 'Gathering Ban' to 'Gathering Restriction' Order for General Entertainment Venues like Room Salons

Enhanced Quarantine Measures to Take Effect from 6 PM on the 15th

[Asia Economy Reporter Jo In-kyung] Seoul City will implement a 'gathering restriction' order with strengthened quarantine rules for entertainment facilities such as room salons starting from 6 p.m. on the 15th.

The measure eases the previous 'gathering ban' order by one level to a gathering restriction, but aims to strictly enforce quarantine rules and hold business owners responsible if confirmed cases of COVID-19 occur.

This gathering restriction order will first apply to general entertainment facilities such as room salons, which have relatively lower transmission risk in terms of activity level and proximity, and will be gradually extended to dance entertainment facilities such as clubs, colatecs, and emotional pubs.

In Seoul, since May 9, the day after confirmed cases occurred at Itaewon clubs, an administrative order banning gatherings has been in effect at all entertainment facilities.

The city explained that the strengthened quarantine rules include the criteria for downgrading high-risk facilities to medium-risk facilities announced by the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters, and that the gathering restriction order will be implemented on the premise that all these rules are strictly followed.

The strengthened quarantine rules limit the number of users per area, maintain a distance of at least 1 meter between tables, and operate by advance reservation during peak hours such as weekends to reduce density and activity levels. In addition, visitor records will be managed through the mandatory electronic entry log (KI-pass) applied to eight high-risk facilities, which will be automatically deleted after four weeks to minimize COVID-19 outbreak concerns.

Despite these measures, businesses that do not comply with quarantine rules among the gathering-restricted facilities will be immediately converted to a gathering ban under the name of the district mayor upon detection. Furthermore, if businesses under the gathering ban fail to comply, they will be subject to prosecution, and all costs including quarantine expenses and patient treatment fees will be claimed as damages if confirmed cases occur.

A Seoul city official stated, "While considering the livelihoods of businesses struggling due to more than a month of gathering ban measures, we plan to minimize citizens' concerns about group infections at entertainment facilities by strengthening business owners' responsibilities to enable immediate action, and to hold users strongly accountable through prosecution under the Infectious Disease Control and Prevention Act if violations occur."

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