New Confirmed Cases 104,829, Over 100,000 on Weekend... 439 Critically Ill (Summary)

On the 20th, when the number of new COVID-19 cases remained in the 100,000 range for the third consecutive day, citizens visited the temporary screening clinic in front of Seoul City Hall. Photo by Moon Honam munonam@

[Asia Economy Reporter Kang Nahum] Due to the spread of the Omicron variant, over 100,000 new confirmed cases were reported again on the 20th. The number of critically ill patients surged by 31 from the previous day, marking two consecutive days in the 400s.

The Central Disease Control Headquarters announced that as of midnight on this day, 104,829 new confirmed cases were added, bringing the cumulative total to 1,962,837. The number of new confirmed cases increased by 2,618 compared to the previous day (102,211). Despite the decrease in the number of tests during the weekend, the number of confirmed cases did not decline and remained in the 100,000 range.

From the 14th, the daily new confirmed cases over the week were 54,615 → 57,169 → 90,439 → 93,131 → 109,831 → 102,211 → 104,829, averaging about 87,461 cases per day.

By region, Gyeonggi reported 31,326 cases, Seoul 22,100 cases, and Incheon 9,188 cases, totaling 62,614 cases (59.8%) in the metropolitan area alone.

Non-metropolitan areas reported 6,940 cases in Busan, 5,087 in Gyeongnam, 4,707 in Daegu, 3,343 in Chungnam, 3,342 in Gyeongbuk, 3,106 in Daejeon, 2,778 in Jeonbuk, 2,656 in Gwangju, 2,302 in Chungbuk, 2,060 in Jeonnam, 1,990 in Gangwon, 1,919 in Ulsan, 1,231 in Jeju, and 657 in Sejong, totaling 42,118 cases (40.2%).

The number of critically ill patients was 439, an increase of 31 from the previous day (408).

The number of critically ill patients had remained in the 200s for 16 days since the 29th of last month (288), then recorded the 300s for five days starting from the 14th (306), and showed an increasing trend by rising to the 400s as of the previous day.

The nationwide COVID-19 severe bed occupancy rate was 32.5% (862 out of 2,651 beds in use), up 1.5 percentage points from the previous day (31.0%).

The number of deaths on the previous day was 51, bringing the cumulative death toll to 7,405. The cumulative fatality rate stands at 0.38%.

The government expects the COVID-19 outbreak to peak between the end of this month and early next month. It predicts 130,000 new confirmed cases on the 23rd of this month and 180,000 on the 2nd of next month.

At this rate, the cumulative number of confirmed cases as of midnight on the 21st is expected to exceed 2 million. It took about two years since the first confirmed case in the country for the cumulative confirmed cases to surpass 1 million on the 6th of this month, and an additional 1 million cases have occurred within just half a month.

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