What the Korea Centers for Disease Control is essentially saying is that the coronavirus detection kit was faulty and that is why it is showing reinfections:
Some coronavirus patients in Korea who tested positive for Covid-19 after recovery — sparking alarm about possible reinfections — probably did so because the country’s sensitive testing procedure detected “dead” virus fragments within their bodies.
A clinical committee for new infectious diseases within the state-backed National Medical Center said Wednesday in a press briefing that there was a low chance that those people were actually reinfected with Covid-19 and said the country’s RT-PCR testing method seemed to have confused a dead virus fragment with an active one.
Fears of reinfection arose after the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported cases of recovered patients testing positive for Covid-19 again. By Monday, there were at least 277 people who fell into that category.
You can read more at the link.
This is quite a tragedy that happened in Icheon:
Police on Thursday strived to identify some of the 38 construction workers killed in a warehouse fire in Icheon, south of Seoul, after wrapping up a search and rescue operation in one of the country’s deadliest blazes in years.
The fire, which injured 10 others, two of them seriously, engulfed a four-story building under construction in Icheon, 50 kilometers southeast of Seoul, on Wednesday afternoon and was put out five hours later.
Yonhap
Here is what President Moon had to say:
President Moon Jae-in voiced regret that another massive fire had taken place despite government safety measures put in place following fatal fires in 2017 and 2018. A fire at a sports center in Jecheon killed 29 people and injured 40 others in December 2017, and another occurred in Miryang, killing 45 and injuring 147 only a month later in 2018.
Korea Times
You can read more at the link, but I do find it interesting how moderate the media coverage of a major mass casualty death like this is getting.
This will be a big step reopen schools, not so much for the students who really aren’t effected by the coronavirus, but the teachers and family members they may spread the virus to:
The government appears to be in a dilemma over whether to resume normal classes at schools, according to education officials Tuesday, as the number of new coronavirus infections has been on a downward trend.
Korea Times
Officials want to open schools as quickly as possible and return teachers and students to classrooms. But at the same time, they are equally concerned that if they open the schools too soon, they could become a hotbed for the highly contagious virus as students come into contact with one another.
As the number of newly confirmed daily cases of COVID-19 has stayed around 15 or less for 10 consecutive days, many educators, teachers and students expect to see schools resuming normal classes. Schools have been closed since March 2, when the new school semester was originally scheduled to commence.
The Ministry of Education said Tuesday that it had held a videoconference with local education superintendents to come up with a detailed plan for any reopening. During the conference, Education Minister Yoo Eun-hae and the 17 regional superintendents discussed how to resume normal classes while preventing them from becoming hotbeds for the coronavirus.
A decision is expected between May 3 and 5, after the government decides whether to further ease social distancing next week.
You can read more at the link.
The only problem with the proposed Inter-Korean Railway project is that the North Koreans have not agreed to it yet. However, I suspect that this will be part of an effort to restart tourism to the Kumgang Resort in North Korea that the Moon administration will eventually try to circumvent sanctions to do if they are not dropped by the time this railway extension is completed:
The South Korean government on Monday held a ceremony to reconnect its railroad system to the North’s, marking the second anniversary of the inter-Korean summit at Panmunjom in 2018.
South Korea’s railway on its eastern coast, called the Northern East Sea Line, will be extended by a total of 110.9 kilometers (69 miles) from its current northernmost point in Gangneung all the way to Jaejin Station in Goseong County, Gangwon, the last stop on South Korean territory below the military demarcation line with the North.
Unification Minister Kim Yeon-chul, who led the ceremony, in an opening address called the construction of the railway a “Korean Peninsula New Deal” project meant to “inaugurate a new age in which the continent meets the ocean.”
Joong Ang Ilbo
You can read more at the link.
