Korea to buy oral Covid-19 treatment for over 400,000 patients

The health authorities plan to pre-purchase more than 400,000 oral Covid-19 medications from multinational pharmaceutical companies and distribute them to patients in the first quarter of next year.

"The government plans to pre-purchase 404,000 oral treatments from three companies -- MSD, Pfizer, and Roche," the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters (CDSCH) said. "It will be available from the first quarter of 2020."

The government signed a deal with MSD to purchase 200,000 last month and 70,000 with Pfizer this month.

"We will speed up efforts to secure the amount for the remaining 134,000 people by closely monitoring the clinical progress of multinational drugmakers and authorities' approval," the headquarters said. Health authorities plan to use oral treatments in treating those with underlying illnesses, elderly patients, and others with acute Covid-19 symptoms.

They also will make additional purchases in stages considering the patients’ situation, officials said.

On Friday, the authorities also announced the first phase of the "living-with-Covid" scheme to be imposed for four weeks.

Under the new measures, the government will ease gathering restrictions to 10 in the greater Seoul area and 12 in non-capital regions regardless of vaccination and lift business hour restrictions for businesses except for nightlife establishments.

Currently, the government allows private gatherings of up to eight people, including four vaccinated, in the Seoul metro region after 6 p.m., and a maximum of 10 people, including six fully vaccinated people, for the rest of the country.

However, restaurants and cafes can only have up to four customers if they have not received the vaccine, and basic preventive measures, such as wearing masks indoors, will remain in effect.

The government will also give a grace period before introducing the controversial vaccine pass system. It requires visitors to multi-use facilities to have a vaccination certificate or negative test result when entering high-risk facilities. However, the system has received criticism from some citizens for discriminating against unvaccinated people.

The government will give a grace period of two weeks until Nov. 14 for indoor sports facilities, considering the need to refund or extend the period and one week for other high-risk facilities.

Despite the planned easing of virus curbs, health officials urged the public to remain vigilant as the increasing movements and activities, coupled with the Halloween season and the chilly weather, might further increase cases.

The country added 2,124 Covid-19 cases, including 2,094 local infections, raising the total caseload to 360,536, according to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA). Nine more people died from the virus, raising the death toll to 2,817 with a fatality rate of 0.78 percent.

The KDCA also stressed that the nation has finally provided at least one shot of the Covid-19 vaccine to more than 80 percent of the population on Friday.

As of 4:00 p.m., the cumulative number of people who received the first vaccine shot stood at 41,080,122, or 80 percent of the total population, making Korea the fifth nation globally to surpass the 80 percent mark after Portugal, Iceland, Spain, and Chile.

"We will do our best to ensure that the remaining vaccinations for children and adolescents and pregnant women, and booster shots planned from the fourth quarter, can be safely carried out," the KCDA said.