More than 10 million receive first dose of COVID-19 vaccine in S. Korea

Posted on : 2021-06-11 16:46 KST Modified on : 2021-06-11 16:46 KST
Disease prevention authorities are currently fine-tuning a third-quarter vaccination plan to be announced next week
People wait to get vaccinated Thursday at a clinic in Seoul. (Yonhap News)
People wait to get vaccinated Thursday at a clinic in Seoul. (Yonhap News)

The cumulative number of South Koreans who have received COVID-19 vaccinations passed 10 million Thursday, 105 days after domestic inoculations began.

Disease prevention authorities are currently fine-tuning a third-quarter vaccination plan to be announced next week, while predicting that the number of confirmed cases in South Korea will begin dropping sharply by mid-July.

Following remarks by Second Vice Health Minister Kang Do-tae about an examination into whether non-face-to-face caregiving workers should be given priority consideration for vaccination, many are watching to see what final decision the disease prevention authorities reach.

The COVID-19 vaccination response team announced Thursday that the number of people who had received at least one dose of a vaccine was provisionally estimated at 10,457,888 as of 4 pm that day.

The number represents 20 percent of South Korea’s total population. As recently as late April, only 3.36 million people in South Korea had received at least a first dose.

But with 6 million people receiving vaccinations within 15 days of the May 27 launch of large-scale phased administration to ordinary South Koreans aged 60 and over, the cumulative total has since passed 10 million.

Between Friday and Wednesday, another 890,000 military employees, reservists, civil defense corps members and others are scheduled to receive doses of the Janssen vaccine provided by the US government.

Online vaccination reservations are also set to resume between midnight on June 28 and 6 pm on June 30 for “socially essential workers” under 30 who were either unable to make reservations due to the system’s early closure or whose names were left out of the previous list. Those with reservations are to receive the Pfizer vaccine between July 5 and 17.

A pledge was made to ensure that inoculations will be available in July for any people aged 60 to 64 who make reservations to receive the AstraZeneca vaccine but are unable to receive them during June due to supply imbalance issues.

“We will absolutely be providing vaccinations [for this group] during July, and we plan to provide individual guidance on the vaccination schedule so that there are no concerns,” said Jung Eun-kyeong, commissioner of the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) and director of the vaccination team, on Thursday.

“We plan to base our decision on what vaccine the older recipients with an adjusted schedule will be receiving on the third quarter vaccine supply schedule,” she added.

The shortfall amounts to 500,000 doses based on a simple calculation, although the South Korean government believes it can be reduced by using low dead space syringes.

The vaccination team is making headway toward deciding its vaccination priorities as it prepares to announce the third quarter administration plan next week.

The top priority for the third quarter will be on the people aged 60 to 74 who did not receive a jab in June. The administration schedule is also to be hastened for teachers at kindergartens, daycare centers and elementary schools, whose vaccination start date was previously pushed back from June to July.

Third-year high school students and those retaking the College Scholastic Ability Test — or “Suneung” — are to receive their inoculations during the summer vacation in July and August.

Plans to prioritize administration of doses to people in their 50s have also been finalized. The reason has to do with the high prevalence of chronic conditions within the age group, which accounts for the highest rate of severe and critical COVID-19 symptoms after patients in their 60s.

Other than that, no decision has yet been made on whether to separately develop a priority vaccination schedule during the third quarter for other specific groups.

On Thursday, Kang said the KDCA was “considering whether to prioritize vaccination in areas where non-face-to-face caregiving is essential.”

But Jung remained tight-lipped, saying only that the agency was “weighing the need for administration according to age group or selecting other priority vaccination targets” and that an “announcement will be made based on an examination and review by the vaccination expert committee.”

The same day, Jung also said, “We anticipate that the number of confirmed cases will drop further starting around mid-July if we maintain the current disease control guidelines and reach our goal of inoculating 13 million people during the first half of the year and vaccinating over 25 percent of the total population.”

But variant forms of the COVID-19 virus remain a potential variable.

“The UK has shown a trend where the prevalence of the alpha variant originating in the UK is rapidly giving way to the delta variant originating in India, and we here in Korea also need to be alert about the spread of the delta variant,” Jung said.

By Seo Hye-mi, staff reporter

Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]

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