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Health workers at a quarantine facility in Incheon on Jan. 30. (Yonhap News)

The number of confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus in South Korea has climbed to 11. One of them was not someone who’d entered South Korea from Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak, but rather someone who’d shared a meal with an infected individual staying in the country. As the first example of person-to-person transmission in the country, this is stoking concerns that the disease could spread domestically.

Two cases were confirmed on Jan. 30, while four more were confirmed the next day. Among these was the first instance of infection spreading among family members.

South Korea’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) announced on the afternoon of Jan. 30 that two more individuals had tested positive for the coronavirus. The third patient, a 32-year-old Korean man, had been in Wuhan on business, returning to South Korea on Jan. 24. This man had an intermittent cough, which he attributed to his chronic asthma, but because he didn’t have a fever, he was placed under active surveillance. Active surveillance means that an individual isn’t under quarantine but is routinely monitored at public health centers for changes in their symptoms. After a recent test came back positive, the man was placed in quarantine on Thursday at Seoul Medical Center.

The sixth person to test positive, a 56-year-old Korean man, was one of the 95 individuals who had been in contact with the third infected individual. Those two individuals reportedly shared a meal at the Hanilgwan restaurant in Seoul’s Gangnam District, on Jan. 22.

The sixth patient was placed under active surveillance on Jan. 26 after being identified as one of those who’d been in contact with the third patient and tested positive in a subsequently administered test. This suggests that further cases of the illness might arise among the other 80 people who came into routine (rather than close) contact with the third patient in hospitals, hotels, and restaurants in Gangnam and Ilsan. This patient is currently being treated under quarantine at Seoul National University Hospital.

Two of the four additional cases were family members who were caught the virus from the sixth patient. One entered South Korean from Wuhan with no symptoms, while the other had contact with someone who’d come in from Wuhan.

“We’ll be announcing the interim results of a further in-depth epidemiological survey on Jan. 31,” said Koh Jae-yeong, head of emergency communication for the task force coordinating the government’s disease control measures.

The KCDC only announced the additional cases on Thursday afternoon and held off on releasing information about the method of transmission, causing unnecessary confusion. The KCDC didn’t disclose the sixth patient’s relationship with the third patient until the story was covered in the media that evening.

Despite the first case of person-to-person transmission, experts say that the information released to date doesn’t warrant serious concerns about local transmission. “Because the individual infected through person-to-person transmission was under [active] surveillance, this should be seen as a limited local infection,” said Bang Ji-hwan, a professor of infectious disease at SMG-SNU Boramae Medical Center.

By Park Su-ji and Park Da-ha, staff reporters

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