hankyoreh

People wait for the results of rapid antigen tests outside of a COVID-19 screening station in the city of Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province, on Monday afternoon. (Yonhap News)

The number of new COVID-19 cases diagnosed on Tuesday soared to over 90,000 for the first time amid the spread of the virus’s Omicron variant.

The official toll for the day, tallied until midnight Tuesday and announced Wednesday morning, stood at 90,443.

That is a 58% increase from the 57,164 cases tallied on Monday. Even with the rapid rise, disease control authorities plan to announce adjustments to the social distancing scheme on Friday that are likely to include the easing of restrictions.

The government is currently weighing an approach in which it keeps its COVID-19 “passport” system in place — requiring proof of vaccination or a negative test result to visit certain facilities — while relaxing other restrictions capping private gatherings at six people and barring restaurants, coffee shops, and other establishments from operating past 9 pm.

The new plan is to be announced Friday after being finalized at a meeting of the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasure Headquarters that morning following discussions Thursday by the new normal recovery support committee.

According to the Hankyoreh’s investigation Tuesday, the administration is seriously considering extending operating hours to 10 pm and raising the private gathering cap to eight people when the current social distancing measures expire on Sunday.

But sources also said it was considering additional easing of measures, including removing the cap on private gatherings altogether and allowing establishments to operate until midnight.

“The trend we’ve observed in other countries has been a major rise in confirmed cases, followed two weeks later by a rise in severe and critical cases, but South Korea hasn’t experienced a rise in severe cases,” an administration official commented.

“It looks as though we’ll be able to relax our social distancing regime,” they said.

As of Jan. 24, when the Omicron variant first became the dominant strain in South Korea with a detection rate above 50%, the number of patients in severe or critical conditions stood at 392. That number subsequently dropped below 300, where it remained for some time.

But with the recent rise in confirmed cases, the number of patients in severe and critical condition was back above 300 as of Monday.

The administration’s stance is that even with severe and critical cases climbing again amid the sharp rise in overall cases, it cannot continue implementing the same intensive distancing measures.

Indeed, Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum has repeatedly alluded to the possibility of relaxing distancing restrictions. Appearing on the KBS news program “Emergency Diagnosis” on Monday, he said, “The government has an obligation to answer the cries of small business owners who have been forced to endure suffering for seven weeks and longer, and it needs to consider the desperate situation for the people’s economy.”

“We intend to make the right determination between experts and small business owners,” he added.

Within the administration, some voiced concerns that loosening restrictions too quickly could lead to an explosive rise in COVID-19 cases.

Appearing on the same program as Kim, Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) Commissioner Jeong Eun-kyeong said the most stable approach would be to relax disease control measures after cases have peaked.

“I think the most stable way would be to wait until after the peak and the two weeks that it takes before cases reach the critical stage,” she noted.

“But there are some things you can’t consider solely in terms of disease control, and the decision will be based on a more general determination,” she added.

Eom Joong-sik, a professor of infectious disease at Gachon University Gil Medical Center, predicted that if the current disease control regime is relaxed, the “rate of the spread could be faster than expected, with an extremely high peak.”

“We could end up seeing a lot more confirmed cases than anticipated,” he said.

“If confirmed cases rise over a short time, that leads to an explosion in severe cases that the healthcare system is unable to cope with,” he added, saying that Korea could be in for a “tough March if the easing [of restrictions] is too comprehensive and all-out.”

Earlier, disease control authorities predicted that the daily caseload could reach between 130,000 and 170,000 patients by late February.

As it began transitioning toward a disease control system that places less emphasis on epidemiological investigation, the administration announced that it planned to discontinue the use of QR codes and telephone confirmation to record visits to establishments. But the “passport” system appears very likely to be retained separately from that.

“Since the infection rate is higher among people who are not vaccinated against COVID-19 than among those who are vaccinated, we believe the use of passports can reduce the rate of infection among the vaccinated,” an administration official said.

But Son Young-rae, director of social strategy for the Central Disaster Management Headquarters, raised the possibility that the passport system could also be partially loosened.

“We plan to continue examining whether [the passport system] should be partially adjusted as we revise the overall disease control system and observe the current trends of the disease’s spread,” he said.

After making a final determination based on factors such as healthcare system capabilities and the number of severe and critical cases, the administration plans to announce the revised distancing plan on Friday.

“We’re listening to a wider range of views, with the aim of making a decision on Friday,” Son said.

As the Omicron variant has continued to spread, the daily tally of new domestic COVID-19 cases had exceeded 50,000 for a sixth straight day on Tuesday. As of the end of the day Monday, the Central Disease Control Headquarters counted a total of 314 severe or critical cases, up by eight from 306 the day before.

Severe and critical cases have recently been rebounding after remaining consistently below 300 since Jan. 29.

As of 5 pm on Monday, the COVID-19 sickbed usage rate was 26.8%. While this indicates availability for additional severe and critical patients, it was also up from the 16.9% rate recorded on Feb. 6.

By Park June-yong, staff reporter

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