Delta variants, labor union rally hamper anti-coronavirus fight

Korea's daily new coronavirus cases dropped Friday from the previous day's all-time high. Still, health authorities extended the toughest virus curbs in the wider Seoul area for two more weeks to curb a further rise in new infections.

The country added 1,630 COVID-19 cases, including 1,574 local infections, raising the total caseload to 185,733, according to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA). The figure was down from 1,842 on Thursday.

The daily caseload has remained above 1,000 for 17 days since July 7 due to the resurgence in the greater Seoul area. The coronavirus has been spreading across the nation with increased activities in the summer season and the fast rise of the highly contagious delta variant. Three more people died from the virus, raising the death toll to 2,066 with a fatality rate of 1.11 percent.

The nation has tested 11,388,305 suspected patients since Jan. 3.

According to quarantine officials, although the spread of the Covid-19 virus in the metropolitan area has slowed somewhat, it has not yet turned to a decreasing trend. Moreover, various quarantine indicators have worsened, such as the detection rate of Delta variants and unknown infection routes increasing.

Lee Ki-il, an official from the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters, said the metro region is still in a dangerous situation.

"It is difficult to alleviate the current level of quarantine to reliably convert and stabilize the increase in epidemics in the metropolitan area," Lee said. "The fourth viral wave is the result of the accumulation of infections from silent spreader that have gone undetected for a long time."

It looks like it will take some time to reduce the number of patients, he added.

The government said that it would extend the toughest virus restrictions in the greater Seoul area for another two weeks due to the fourth viral wave showing no sign of letdown.

The greater Seoul area, including Gyeonggi Province and Incheon, has been under the Level 4 distancing scheme since July 12. With the extended measure, the metropolitan area will be under a semi-lockdown until Aug. 8.

Under Level 4 measures, the government has banned gatherings of more than two people after 6 p.m. and placed a 10 p.m. curfew on restaurants and cafes and a ban on nightclubs and bars.

Despite the virus showing few signs of a letdown, health officials have also expressed concerns that another explosive coronavirus outbreak may come soon as 1,000 members of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) held a massive rally in Wonju, Gangwon Province, on Friday.

The KCTU decided to go on with its plans to hold the rally to support a walkout of unionized workers of the National Health Insurance Service's call center, despite repeated calls from the government to scrap its plan on concerns of potential infections from the gatherings.

The city and police officials stressed that they would take strong actions against those who violate virus rules.

"We plan to block gatherings at the site by all means and take legal action strictly in accordance with the law and principles for illegal activities such as holding prohibited assemblies," a police official said. "In principle, any illegal and violent acts, such as obstruction of the execution of official duties, will be arrested, and we plan to pursue and punish all other illegal to the end without exception."

The most recent rally comes even though the KCTU received harsh criticism from the public for holding a massive rally in downtown Seoul on July 3 with about 8,000 attendants despite the government's repeated warnings.

In response, police had booked 23 KCTU members for violating quarantine regulations during the rally.

The government has vaccinated 16,723,537 people – 10,403,490 with the AstraZeneca vaccine, 5,127,065 with Pfizer's vaccine, 1,129,713 with Janssen's vaccine, and 63,269 with Moderna's vaccine – with the first shot of the vaccine up 140,190 from the previous day.