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| Citizens wearing protective masks wait for the bus in Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province, Wednesday, amid growing concerns over the spread of the new deadly coronavirus that originated from Wuhan, China. /Yonhap |
By Bahk Eun-ji
The government has failed to ease growing concerns over the spread of coronavirus from China as health authorities were unable to adequately monitor infected patients and those in contact with them, according to opposition parties and doctors' groups, Wednesday.
"I strongly doubt whether President Moon Jae-in puts the highest priority on protecting our people," said Rep. Ha Tae-keung of the minor Bareunmirae Party on his Facebook page.
"The public learned of the importance of quarantine after experiencing the 2015 MERS outbreak, which killed 38 people, but this massive infectious disease reveals a bungling government system once again," Ha said.
Because people are so anxious about the disease, Ha said he strongly urges the government to use initiative to solve the problem.
He went on to say that he didn't understand why the government did not impose an entry ban on those coming from Wuhan.
"People travelling to Korea from Wuhan should be banned from entering the country. Since the Chinese government has also closed down the area of Wuhan, it is reasonable for the Korean government to impose an entry ban on those who want to enter this country only from Wuhan, not the entire mainland," Ha said.
Rep. Shim Jae-chul of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party also criticized the government's belated response.
"Cheong Wa Dae is supposed to be a control tower, but it is unable to do its role. The government should take all measures in the early stages before it becomes a serious epidemic by checking not only people who visited only Wuhan but all inbound passengers," Shim said.
When the 55-year-old male patient, who was confirmed as the fourth case here, returned from Wuhan, China, he visited a medical institution to report a sore throat and suspicious symptoms but he allegedly didn't inform the health authorities about his recent visit to the Chinese city. The patient went several days without being quarantined.
According to the results of an epidemiological investigation released by the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC), the fourth confirmed patient returned home from Wuhan on Jan. 20 and visited a domestic medical institution the next day due to cold symptoms. The patient was finally confirmed as the fourth infected patient in Korea on Jan. 27 and was quarantined that day.
The problem was that during the first visit to the medical institution on Jan. 21, the doctor did not report the case to the health authorities despite knowing that the patient visited Wuhan. Currently, the government shares the list of visitors to Wuhan through Drug Utilization Review (DUR), a computerized system installed in all medical institutions across the country.
The doctor asked the patient if he had visited Wuhan, but the patient just answered that he had visited China.
The KCDC also admitted the loophole in the quarantine network, saying rapid reporting and isolation measures are most important at the local institution level because it is difficult to screen patients not showing any symptoms.
The Korean Medical Association (KMA), an association of doctors, reported its regret over the situation.
"The association recommends hospitals and medical institutions use the DUR system, but they are not obliged to use it," said Park Jong-hyuk, a spokesperson of the KMA.
Park said there are no penalties for not using the system or for failing to report the patient's history of overseas travel to the health authorities, so it is not reasonable to lay all the blame on the doctor.
On Tuesday afternoon, the government decided to send chartered flights to Wuhan to evacuate Korean nationals, a measure taken later than other countries. It also began to conduct a full investigation of 3,023 people who visited Wuhan on the day when the serious impact of the new virus began in general socio-economic sectors.
Critics say the government's measure is already belated, although the country learned from the experience with the outbreak of the Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) in 2015.
The public was critical of the government in 2015 for its unskilled response to the outbreak by failing to adequately implement quarantine measures and not sharing information transparently with the public.
