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Chinese Study Says People With Type O Blood More Resistant to Coronavirus

This was a Chinese study, so like with any information coming from China be suspicious of its accuracy:

People with type A blood are more likely to catch coronavirus while those with type O seem more resistant, a preliminary study of about 2,000 patients in China showed. 

A team of Chinese researchers, led by Wang Xinghuan from the Centre for Evidence-Based and Translational Medicine at Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University, conducted the study. 

They took blood group patterns of patients in Wuhan and Shenzhen and compared them to local healthy populations. They found that blood type A patients showed a higher rate of infection and tended to develop more severe symptoms.

In the general population, type O blood (34 percent) is more common than type A (32 percent). But in the infected, this was reversed, with type O people at 25 percent and type A at 41 percent. People with type O blood made up 25 percent of deaths in the research. Normally, people with type O blood account for 32 percent Wuhan’s population. 

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

U.S. Embassy in Seoul Suspends All Visa Services

I am surprised this did not happen sooner:

The U.S. Embassy in Seoul said Wednesday that it will suspend all routine visa services from Thursday for an unspecified period of time in keeping with the State Department’s measures to respond to the new coronavirus outbreak.

The embassy said in a statement that it “will cancel all routine immigrant and nonimmigrant visa appointments” starting Thursday. However, this will not affect the existing visa waiver program, and services to U.S. citizens will continue.

The visa waiver enables Korean nationals to travel to the United States for tourism or business purposes for 90 days or less without obtaining a visa. 

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.

Tweet of the Day: Norway’s Military Hospital During the Korean War

https://twitter.com/UN_Command/status/1239041370230120448

Picture of the Day: The Future of Public Transportation?

Whole-body sterilizer
Whole-body sterilizerCitizens use a whole-body sterilizer set up at a subway station in Daegu, 300 kilometers southeast of Seoul, on March 16, 2020, amid the coronavirus crisis. (Yonhap) 

People Returning from Europe Helping to Spread Coronavirus in South Korea

If people from Europe are spreading the coronavirus so much you would think the Moon administration would either restrict travel or put people into mandatory quarantine:

In Busan, a 24-year-old Korean male who recently traveled around Europe, including Italy, which now has the second-highest number of infections after China, tested positive for the coronavirus on March 10 upon his return to Korea, Busan officials said.

The man left for Europe on Feb. 9, returned to Korea on March 4 and started showing symptoms from March 9. Nevertheless, he dined at a restaurant, went to a coffee shop and rode the Busan subway until he finally tested positive on March 10.  

A 44-year-old Korean woman in Gwangju likewise traveled to Europe for two weeks earlier this month and came down with a cough last Wednesday. She arrived in Korea last Thursday but was able to pass through customs at Incheon International Airport because her temperature was within the normal range, said Gwangju officials. She took an airport limousine from Incheon to Gwangju, which was a four-hour ride, and mostly stayed home till she tested positive for the virus last Saturday. 

In Seoul, a French female national who arrived in Korea on March 9 started showing symptoms of a cough last Wednesday and turned out positive on Friday. Her male Korean friend was also tested and turned out positive Saturday. Seoul officials believe the French national contracted the disease from her father in France, who informed his daughter last Thursday that he was infected. 

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.

Trump Says South Korea “Did A Good Job” in Coronavirus Fight, But Had Trouble at the Beginning

President Trump is absolutely right about South Korea’s slow start, but I would not say South Korea had a “great number of deaths”. The mortality rate is very low in South Korea:

 U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday that South Korea did a “good job” handling the coronavirus outbreak but also had “tremendous problems” at the start.

Trump made the remark at a White House press briefing as he defended his own administration’s response to the growing outbreak in the United States.

“I noticed a lot of people are talking about South Korea because they’ve done a good job on one side, but on the other side, tremendous problems at the beginning,” he said. “They had tremendous problems and great numbers of death.”

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but South Korea current has 8,236 positive infections with 75 deaths. That is a .009 mortality rate currently. As long as Americans handle this issue smartly by not getting the elderly and those with compromised immune systems infected the mortality rate should remain low in the U.S. as well.

Seongnam Church Spreads COVID-19 to Followers Believing Spraying Saltwater Kills Coronavirus

This has to be the stupidest way we have seen the coronavirus spread in South Korea:

A new cluster of coronavirus has emerged at a church in South Korea after members used a saltwater spray — which they believed prevented the spread of the virus — but used the same spray bottle on members without properly disinfecting the nozzle, health officials acknowledged Monday.

Officials in the city of Seongnam, located in the Gyeonggi Province south of Seoul, said 40 additional members of the River of Grace Community Church have tested positive for COVID-19 after six members, including the pastor and his wife, were confirmed in the past week to have the virus.

All of those infected may have attended the same service on March 8, according to the Yonhap News Agency. (……..)

“This made it inevitable for the virus to spread,” he added. “They did so out of the false belief that saltwater kills the virus.”

Fox News via a reader tip

You can read more at the link, but I don’t know what is worse, the minister believing that salt water kills COVID-19 or all the followers blindly following his instructions to use the spray bottle on each other?

You would think someone in the congregation would think this is idiotic.

Korean Left Creates Satellite Political Parties to Increase Proportional Representatives in Parliament

Remember when the election law for proportional representation seats was passed to help the Korean left remain in power in the parliament. Well here is their next phase in ensuring they maintain power, make left wing satellite political parties to increase proportional representation seats for the Korean left:

Assembly Speaker Moon Hee-sang, center, bangs the gavel to announce that the National Assembly approved the election revision bill on December 28th. Moon made his way to his seat despite a physical blockage by the main opposition Liberty Korea Party lawmakers. 

The ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) has decided to take part in an initiative to form a liberal satellite political party designed to win more proportional representation seats in the April 15 general election. In a vote of all party members conducted last week, about 241,000 members cast ballots and 74 percent supported the move. (……..)

DPK Chairman Lee Hae-chan defended the party’s decision, saying it was an inevitable choice to stop the conservative opposition United Future Party (UFP) from becoming the largest party and blocking reform measures pushed by the Moon Jae-in administration. 

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but it is very clear that the Korean left will use every trick legal or illegal to win the parliamentary elections next month.

Tweet of the Day: Good News from South Korea

Picture of the Day: Deserted Korean Bullet Train

Empty bullet train
Empty bullet train
An SRT bullet train departing from Gwangju, 330 kilometers south of Seoul, is almost empty as it heads for Suseo Station in the southwestern part of the capital city, on March 13, 2020. There has been a sharp drop in people using public transportation amid the spread of the novel coronavirus in South Korea. (Yonhap)