This June 10, 2021, file photo shows a medical worker filling up a syringe with COVID-19 vaccine at a hospital in Daejeon, about 160 kilometers south of Seoul. (Yonhap)
A little over half of South Koreans do not want the government to provide COVID-19 vaccination support to North Korea, according to a recent survey.
In a joint survey by four polling agencies on 1,006 people aged 18 and older from Monday-Wednesday, 51 percent of respondents said they disapprove of delivering coronavirus vaccines to Pyongyang, while 45 percent said they were in favor of the idea.
Last week, President Moon Jae-in said Seoul will push for cooperation with the North on COVID-19 vaccine supplies, if it consents, during a joint news conference held after a South Korea-Austria summit in Vienna.
The remark came amid the announcement of South Korea's commitment to the global vaccine mechanism as a new production hub.
The poll result released Thursday showed that among supporters of the ruling Democratic Party, an overwhelming rate of 74 percent approved of the government's vaccine support proposal.
On the contrary, the rate of respondents against the idea was high among the main opposition People Power Party supporters at 77 percent.
The poll jointly conducted by four Seoul-based pollsters -- Embrain Public, KSTAT Research, Korea Research International Inc. and Hankook Research -- has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points at a 95 percent confidence level. (Yonhap)