As COVID-19 continues to spread like wildfire in North Korea, more than half the patients showing symptoms were reported to be concentrated in the capital city of Pyongyang.
The Rodong Sinmun, the newspaper of the Workers’ Party of Korea Central Committee, published an article Tuesday quoting the national emergency disease control command as reporting an additional 269,510 patients with “fever” symptoms nationwide between 6 pm Sunday and 6 pm Monday, along with 170,460 patients pronounced fully recovered and six deaths.
A day earlier, 392,920 new cases of “fever” were reported, along with eight deaths. While the numbers showed a slight decline, experts raised questions about the credibility of the figures.
By region, Pyongyang showed the largest number of patients with symptoms.
On Tuesday, North Korea’s state-run Korean Central Television disclosed the numbers of symptomatic cases by region as of 6 pm on May 15. The figures included 202,178 cases that day in Pyongyang, accounting for 51.4% of the 392,920 total new cases reported for the same day. The amount was also roughly ten times higher than the 27,479 new cases reported for South Pyongan Province, which accounted for the second-highest number.
Categorizing the 50 deaths by cause, KCTV reported that 25 had died of drug side effects, 22 from underlying conditions, two from febrile seizures, and one from laryngospasm.
Speaking before the National Assembly Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee that day, Minister of Unification Kwon Young-se said, “We’ve sent a communication to the North for humanitarian cooperation, but we have yet to receive any reply from them.”
“We’re also going to need to consider approaches where we go through international organizations or have the private sector provide support,” he suggested.
By Lee Je-hun, senior staff writer
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