Jeonnam Province Launches Comprehensive COVID-19 Testing at Local Nursing Facilities

22,300 People at 622 Facilities Targeted

[Muan=Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Yoon Jamin] Jeonnam Province will conduct comprehensive testing starting from the 14th for 21,300 workers at 622 nursing facilities across the province as a proactive response to COVID-19.

According to Jeonnam Province on the 13th, the nationwide spread of COVID-19 continues, and confirmed cases have been occurring consecutively in the Jeonnam area due to interactions with family and acquaintances and visits to other regions.

In particular, a confirmed case was reported among workers at a nursing hospital in Hwasun the previous day. After conducting comprehensive testing of 548 people including medical staff and patients at this nursing hospital, one additional medical staff member tested positive, while the remaining 547 tested negative.

Given this situation, comprehensive testing has been decided to prevent the occurrence of COVID-19 in nursing facilities, which are vulnerable to the virus.

The tests will be conducted by city and county public health center staff who will visit nursing facilities to collect specimens and then send them to private institutions for analysis. If a confirmed case occurs, the facility will be immediately placed under cohort isolation.

Previously, since October, the province conducted comprehensive testing targeting nursing institutions and welfare facilities for the disabled, all of whom tested negative.

Additionally, since the 7th of last month, as confirmed cases rapidly increased, Jeonnam Province reopened the Naju Living Treatment Center (84 rooms) to preemptively address the shortage of hospital beds in the province, and also increased the number of beds in infectious disease specialized hospitals to 330.

Based on experience treating confirmed patients in Daegu last March, upon hearing about the shortage of beds in Gyeonggi Province, Jeonnam also shared beds for six COVID-19 patients on the 11th.

Kang Young-gu, Director of Health and Welfare at Jeonnam Province, said, “COVID-19 is spreading widely and rapidly across all areas of daily life, so Jeonnam Province plans to conduct comprehensive testing in infection-vulnerable facilities for proactive containment. Under the current situation, there are no separate high-risk facilities, so everyone should be considered a potential contact, and contact between people should be minimized.”

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