North Korea yesterday said that more than 1 million people have already recovered from suspected COVID-19 infections a week after disclosing an outbreak, which it appears to be trying to manage in isolation.
The country’s pandemic response headquarters announced 232,880 new cases of fever and six deaths in state media yesterday.
Those figures raise its totals to 62 deaths and more than 1.7 million fever cases since late last month.
Photo: AP
It said that at least 691,170 people remain in quarantine.
Outside experts believe that most of the fevers are COVID-19, but North Korea lacks tests to confirm so many.
The outbreak is almost certainly greater than the fever tally, as the virus can be carried and spread by people who do not develop fevers or other symptoms.
Photo: EPA-EFE
It is also unclear how more than 1 million people recovered so quickly when limited medicine, medical equipment and health facilities exist to treat the country’s impoverished, unvaccinated population of 26 million people.
Some experts say that the North could be simply releasing people from quarantine after their fevers subside.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Tuesday said that North Korea has not responded to its request for more data about its outbreak.
Before acknowledging COVID-19 infections for the first time last week, North Korea had held to a widely doubted claim of keeping out the virus.
It also shunned millions of vaccine shots offered by the UN-backed COVAX distribution program, likely because of international monitoring requirements attached to them.
North Korea and Eritrea are the only sovereign UN-member countries not to have rolled out vaccines, but Tedros said neither country has responded to the WHO’s offers of vaccines, medicines, tests and technical support.
“WHO is deeply concerned at the risk of further spread in” North Korea, Tedros said, adding that the country has worrying numbers of people with underlying conditions that make them more likely to get severe COVID-19.
WHO Health Emergencies Programme executive director Michael Ryan said that unchecked transmission of the virus could lead to new variants, but the WHO is powerless to act unless countries accept its help.
The North has so far ignored South Korea’s offer to provide vaccines, medicine and health personnel, but experts say that Pyongyang might be more willing to accept help from its main ally, China.
South Korea’s government said it could not confirm media reports that North Korea on Tuesday flew multiple planes to bring back emergency supplies from China.
North Korean officials during a meeting on Tuesday continued to express confidence that the country could overcome the crisis on its own, with politburo members discussing ways for “continuously maintaining the good chance in the overall epidemic prevention front,” the Korean Central News Agency said yesterday.
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