hankyoreh

People wait to be tested for COVID-19 outside of a temporary screening station at Seoul Station in Jung District on Thursday morning. (Yonhap News)

Amid record-shattering COVID-19 case numbers, the South Korean government announced adjustments to its social distancing measures on Friday. Private gatherings will remain capped at six participants, but the 9 pm curfew on business hours for cafes and restaurants will be extended to 10 pm. The changes will go into effect on Saturday.

Small business owners have been demanding the closing time restrictions be lifted while health authorities are proceeding with caution amid record COVID-19 cases in the country.

Official tallies of COVID-19 cases on Thursday, announced Friday morning by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, reached 109,831 — exceeding 100,000 for the first time since the start of the pandemic.

On Wednesday, the number of new cases stood at 93,135 with 389 in serious or critical conditions. It marked the first time that the number of critically ill patients has increased by 76 or more in a day since the end of March 2020, when related statistics first started to be compiled. The number of people undergoing at-home treatment also increased by 48,525 in a single day to reach 314,565.

Son Yong-rae, head of social strategy at the Central Disaster Management Headquarters, said at a briefing Thursday, “The rate of increase in severely ill patients has slowed significantly compared to the Delta [variant].” He added, “We are more than capable of handling up to 1,500-2,000 [critical] cases.”

In a phone call with the Hankyoreh, another government official said, “We are thinking about whether more flexible disease prevention measures are necessary considering the characteristics of Omicron."

At a meeting of the government’s New Normal Recovery Support Committee held Thursday, opinions were sharply divided on whether to ease social distancing measures.

Roh Kwang-pyo, a member of the economic and people's livelihood division of the committee and head of the Korea Employment and Labor Educational Institute said, "Small business owners have demanded that the limit on business hours be completely removed. But the government maintains that it can’t go that far.”

“I think there is a high level of fatigue [related to the social distancing measures], so it appears that the government will ease some of these restrictions,” Roh added. “Small business owners have demanded that the government draw up a roadmap for returning to normal by forecasting trends in the pandemic over the next two to three months.”

But health authorities are urging that more caution be taken when discussing the easing of social distancing measures. Yoon Tae-ho, a professor of preventive medicine at Pusan National University’s school of medicine, says, “Instead of the number of hospital beds available or the number of critically ill patients, problems are more likely to arise in ensuring the stability of essential social services, such as [a lack of] healthcare personnel.”

“Considering this, it is reasonable to maintain the current level [of distancing measures] until the number of confirmed cases reaches its peak,” Yoon noted.

The government's concerns are also deepening out of a fear that Korea could see a repeat of what happened in November of 2021. At the time, the government moved to ease social distancing measures but failed to take into account the fact that older populations’ immunity from vaccines was rapidly declining. The policy did not have its desired effects and led to a paralysis of the medical system.

For this reason, while it seemed likely that the government would opt to increase the number of people allowed at private gatherings to eight and extend business hours to 10 pm, it seemed to reach a compromise by keeping the cap on private gatherings while extending business hours.

By Kwon Ji-dam and Lim Jae-hee, staff reporters

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