De Hyonhee Shin
SEOUL (Reuters) – Six people suffering from COVID-19 died in South Korea this month while waiting for hospital beds and hundreds cannot be admitted as growing coronavirus infections overwhelm the health system, officials said on Friday and media.
South Korea reported 1,062 new cases of coronavirus on Friday, the second-highest number recorded daily, as the government agonized over tighter restrictions and warned companies it was unacceptable to try to avoid closure orders.
The daily number was over 1,000 for the third day in a row, for the first time, according to data from the Korean Agency for Disease Control and Prevention (KDCA).
The eruption of the new cases has shaken a country that has been considered a mitigation success story for months. But despite its total number rising to 47,515 infections, South Korea has suffered only about 650 deaths.
One of those who died waiting for a hospital bed was at home in the capital, Seoul, after testing positive on Saturday, while three others were in a nursing home in Gyeonggi Province.
Yonhap news agency reported two more such deaths in December, but did not provide immediate details.
“We express our deepest condolences and feel strongly responsible,” said Park Yoo-mi, a quarantine officer for the Seoul government.
“The on-site response team in the Seoul metropolitan area is having difficulty allocating beds due to the sharp rise in confirmed cases and the overloading of administration and medical systems since early December.”
Park promised to strengthen the public health system and said 580 patients were waiting for beds in Seoul on Friday, of which 227 had been waiting for at least two days.
The unprecedented rise in serious cases has strained the health system, with only a limited number of critical care beds available, health officials have warned.
Meanwhile, the government is agonizing over whether it will tighten social distance, which would mean ordering 1.2 million businesses to suspend operations.
Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun said that given the burden on businesses, “social consensus” is needed for a decision.
He also said that everyone must comply with the rules of restricting the virus.
“There have been growing attempts to continue the operation in an irregular manner, changing the type of business declared, to go through government anti-virus efforts,” Chung said at a government meeting.
“That can never be acceptable.”
Chung did not give any details, but the media reported that some bars are trying to break the bans by pretending to be restaurants.
(Reporting by Hyonhee Shin; Additional reporting by Sangmi Cha; Writing by Josh Smith Editing by Tom Hogue, Robert Birsel)