Announcement of the 4:30 distance adjustment plan… “Will the ban for more than 5 people be lifted?”

The government announced a proposal to adjust social distancing at 4:30 pm on the 31st, and attention is being focused.

As the average number of new corona19 confirmed this week hit 400, and quarantine indicators such as infectious material production index and weekend movement are deteriorating day by day, the prospects that the current distancing stage and ban on private gatherings with more than 5 people will be maintained.

The Central Defense Countermeasure Headquarters (Bangdaebon) announced that as of 0 o’clock on the 31st, the number of new corona19 confirmed cases in Korea increased by 355, accumulating 78205. It was 103 people less than the previous day, and it fell to 300 in five days.

Looking at the infection route of the new confirmed patients on this day, 325 local outbreaks and 30 foreign inflows were found. As of 0 o’clock on this day, the cumulative positive rate was 1.39% (78,205 out of 5.64 million).

The government explained that the number of confirmed cases could grow again at any time due to the high risk of latent infection in the local community, such as the group infection from IM Mission is still still and the outbreak has been confirmed at Hanyang University Hospital and Boramae Hospital in Seoul.

In fact, in the last week (January 24 to 30), the number of new confirmed cases by day was 392 → 437 → 349 → 559 → 497 → 469 → 458, with an average of 452 cases per day.

Possibility of maintaining the current stage of the distance adjustment plan

On this day, the government will comprehensively analyze the pattern of patient outbreaks, transmission of infection, and opinions of experts to determine whether to extend the distancing adjustment plan and the ban on private gatherings of 5 or more people. After final discussions at the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasure Headquarters meeting presided over by Prime Minister Chung Sye-gyun at 3 pm, the results will be announced through a 4:30 briefing.

Earlier, Jeon Jeon-cheol, 2nd deputy chief of the Great Script (Minister of Public Administration and Security) said, “The trend of corona 19 confirmed patients, which has been stable for a while, continues to spread to 400 people due to group infection of Daejeon IM Mission.” Considering that, more carefully than ever, we are considering whether to change the social distancing stage.”

The government is putting weight on the current steps of distancing and further extending the ban on meetings of five or more people. At the recent Livelihood Prevention Committee, experts’ opinions on whether to ease distancing differed for and against, because the Corona 19 situation has not seldom improved since then.

Sook-young Lim, general manager of the situation, said, “Because the reproductive index of infection is slightly above 1, we are judging whether the incidence of patients is increasing slightly.”

The Infection Reproduction Index is an index showing how many other people are infected by one confirmed person. If this number is more than 1, it means’the spread of the outbreak’, and if it is less than 1, it means’inhibition of the outbreak’. As the number of confirmed cases declined this year, this index fell below 1 for three consecutive weeks, starting from the first week of January to 0.88→0.79→0.82, but recently surpassed 1 again.

Director Lim said, “It is also a concern that the index of social mobility is showing an increase for two weeks in a row. As can be seen in the case of group outbreaks related to the IM mission, a nationwide large-scale group outbreak may appear even with a brief vigilance.” Emphasized.

[류영상 매경닷컴 기자 [email protected]]
[ⓒ 매일경제 & mk.co.kr, 무단전재 및 재배포 금지]