Published : Feb. 8, 2022 - 15:24
A person gets a rapid antigen test for COVID-19 at local testing station in Gwangju, South Jeolla Province. (Yonhap)
South Korea’s daily COVID-19 infections stayed above 35,000 for a fourth straight day for the 24 hours of Monday, government data showed Tuesday.
According to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency, the country’s daily COVID-19 cases for the day marked 36,719, raising the total to 1,081,681.
The daily infections Monday was a twofold increase from the same day of the prior week, when the country’s COVID-19 cases reached 18,340. The figure is also around four times greater than the daily cases reported on the Monday two weeks before.
Health authorities expect the number of daily infections to increase further in the following weeks as the highly transmissible omicron variant will remain the dominant strain in the country.
Over the last week, omicron cases accounted for 92.1 percent of all infections, according to government data.
The KDCA currently anticipates the country’s daily COVID-19 cases to reach between 130,000 and 170,000 by the end of February.
The recent spike in the country’s daily COVID-19 infections, however, has yet to have a significant impact on the number of COVID-19 related deaths and critically ill patients.
The death toll from COVID-19 came to 6,922, up 36 from a day earlier. The fatality rate stood at 0.64 percent.
As of midnight Monday, the number of critically ill COVID-19 patients was 268, down two from the previous day.
Health authorities said that there are enough intensive care unit beds for critically ill COVID-19 patients. Currently, only 18.2 percent of intensive care unit beds are occupied nationwide, according to the KDCA.
However, the country is seeing the number of at-home care patients increasing rapidly.
During the 24 hours of Monday, the number of at-home care patients went up by 12,724, raising the total to 159,169.
The number of at-home care patients is expected to surge in the following weeks to reach around 1 million by early March, according to the KDCA.
To handle the increasing number of at-home care patients, the government said it will make daily checkup calls to only high-risk COVID-19 patients in their 60s or older, as well as those with preexisting medical conditions.
Other patients are to monitor their symptoms and health themselves and contact medical centers if conditions worsen.
By Shim Woo-hyun (
ws@heraldcorp.com)