Suncheon City Reports 12 New COVID-19 Cases... Social Distancing Raised to Level 2

Confirmed Direct and Indirect Contact at a Surgical Clinic in Jogok-dong

From 12 PM on the 5th to 12 PM on the 11th

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Lee Hyung-kwon] Suncheon City, Jeollanam-do (Mayor Heo Seok) announced on the 5th that 12 new COVID-19 cases have been confirmed.

Suncheon City, which reported a total of 12 confirmed cases?3 on the previous day and 9 on the 5th?explained that after a comprehensive analysis of the number of cases, locations, and the movements of confirmed patients, the current situation is more severe than the crisis in August last year.

Suncheon case number 254 showed symptoms such as fever, general fatigue, and difficulty breathing, visited the emergency room at Seonggarolo Hospital, and after testing, was confirmed positive while hospitalized in the hospital’s isolation ward.

Case number 255 experienced severe vomiting and cold symptoms, visited the emergency room at Seonggarolo Hospital for testing, returned home, and was later confirmed positive.

Case number 256 also had severe breathing difficulties due to coughing, visited the emergency room at Seonggarolo Hospital for testing, and was confirmed positive.

The three cases confirmed the previous day were all elderly individuals in their late 70s to early 80s, who frequently visited Dongbu Surgical Clinic located in Jogok-dong for physical therapy and intravenous injections. The city estimates that there was direct or indirect contact among them during the same time period.

The nine cases confirmed this morning are currently under in-depth epidemiological investigation, but are reported to include four employees and visitors of Shenpix Medical Device Company in Jogok-dong, four visitors to Dongbu Surgical Clinic in Jogok-dong, and one contact of a confirmed patient.

The city plans to notify the public via disaster safety text messages and the official website as soon as the movements of confirmed patients are identified through epidemiological investigations.

Mayor Heo Seok of Suncheon said in a briefing, “We judge that the current situation stands at a critical juncture where it could escalate into the fourth major wave,” and added, “After gathering opinions from the public-private joint countermeasure committee, social distancing will be raised to Level 2 from 12:00 noon today until 24:00 on the 11th, for one week.”

With the upgrade to Level 2, five types of entertainment facilities, hold’em pubs, karaoke rooms, indoor standing concert halls, party rooms, and bathhouses are prohibited from gathering from 10:00 PM to 5:00 AM the next day.

Restaurants and cafes are only allowed takeout and delivery from 10:00 PM to 5:00 AM the next day, and religious activities are limited to attendance within 20% of seating capacity.

Events such as weddings and funerals are also permitted only for fewer than 100 people.

Additionally, door-to-door sales and direct sales promotion centers are completely banned.

Mayor Heo stated, “Cluster infections are increasing nationwide, and the number of cases in non-metropolitan areas is also rising significantly. Furthermore, infections from variant viruses with much stronger transmissibility are increasing, so we cannot afford to lower our guard.”

He continued, “From today, enhanced penalties for violations of basic quarantine rules will be fully enforced,” and urged, “Please strictly follow the more detailed and strengthened quarantine guidelines, including always wearing masks, maintaining visitor logs, mandatory ventilation and disinfection, prohibition of eating except for food consumption purposes in facilities, designation of facility quarantine managers, banning entry of symptomatic individuals, and posting the allowed number of users in multi-use facilities.”

He also said, “Compliance with strengthened basic quarantine rules is the shortcut to restoring daily life based on autonomy and responsibility,” and appealed, “Please unite your efforts to strictly observe individual quarantine rules so that we can hasten the recovery of normal life.”

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