"Daily COVID-19 Cases Around 100,000... Severe and Critical Patients Approaching 500"

New COVID-19 Cases at 95,362 ... 469,384 Receiving Home Treatment

On the 18th, when the number of new COVID-19 cases exceeded 100,000 for the first time in history, citizens lined up to get tested at the screening clinic of Songpa-gu Public Health Center in Seoul. Photo by Mun Ho-nam munonam@

With the Omicron variant pandemic continuing, the number of new daily confirmed cases has hovered around 100,000 for six consecutive days, leading to a rapid increase in critically ill patients and deaths. It is pointed out that active preparation is necessary as the number of critically ill patients and deaths is expected to surge in the future.

According to the Central Disease Control Headquarters on the 21st, as of midnight, the number of new COVID-19 confirmed cases nationwide increased by 95,362, bringing the total cumulative confirmed cases to 2,058,184. Although the number of new confirmed cases slightly decreased on this day after exceeding 100,000 for three consecutive days since the 18th, it recorded the highest number ever for a Sunday, when testing volume typically decreases.

Accordingly, the cumulative number of confirmed cases has surpassed 2 million. The cumulative confirmed cases exceeded 1 million on the 6th of this month, 749 days (2 years and 17 days) after the first confirmed case was reported in Korea on January 20, 2020. Subsequently, the daily new confirmed cases rapidly increased from 40,000 on the 9th, 50,000 on the 10th, 90,000 on the 16th, to over 100,000 on the 18th, resulting in an additional 1 million confirmed cases in just half a month.

The number of critically ill patients, which had been maintained in the 200s earlier this month, is approaching 500. After surpassing 300 on the 14th, the number of critically ill patients rose to 389 on the 17th, 408 on the 19th, 439 on the 20th, and reached 480 as of this day.

The number of deaths recorded in a single day yesterday was 45. The number of deaths was 146 in the first week of February (January 30 to February 5), increased to 187 in the second week (February 6 to 12), and surged to 309 last week (February 13 to 19).

Similar to the number of new confirmed cases, the number of patients receiving home treatment is showing a weekly "doubling" phenomenon. As of midnight on this day, the number of home treatment patients was 469,384, more than double (2.02 times) the 232,086 recorded a week earlier on the 14th. Compared to two weeks ago on the 7th, when there were 146,445 patients, it is about 3.21 times higher.

Meanwhile, in the United States, deaths from COVID-19 caused by the Omicron variant have surpassed those caused by the Delta variant. According to The New York Times (NYT), since November 24 last year, there have been 30,163,600 new confirmed cases and approximately 154,750 deaths due to Omicron in the U.S. Compared to the Delta variant, the number of confirmed cases is 2.76 times higher, and deaths are 1.17 times higher.

The NYT stated, "The much lower death rate relative to confirmed cases during the Omicron wave reflects that Omicron is relatively less virulent," but also noted, "When the number of confirmed cases reaches an astronomical figure of 30 million, even a low death rate results in a catastrophic number of deaths."

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