News summary on the way home from work, Subsletter Evening.
It is said that the government is planning to announce a plan to adjust social distancing on Friday the 18th.
Now, social distancing can be summarized as 'up to 6 people at private gatherings, business hours limited to 9pm', right?
It seems that the number of meeting people will increase and the business hours will be longer than this.
Self-employed people, who have been forced to suffer due to prolonged distancing, held a large-scale rally today (15th) in Gwanghwamun.
The use of the QR code for the purpose of the access list is also stopped, but the QR code that acts as a quarantine pass seems to be used continuously.
"Announcement of the adjustment of distance on the 18th"
The plan to adjust the distance is scheduled to be announced on the 18th, which is Friday. At a regular briefing by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, Sohn Young-rae, head of the social strategy division, is collecting opinions from experts from various fields, including members of the Daily Recovery Support Committee, with the goal of announcing the adjustment plan on the 18th. He said, "We are listening to various opinions because we have to decide how much social and economic damage we will suffer according to the change in the characteristics of the epidemic due to the dominance of the omicron mutation."
Although the quarantine authorities did not say specifically how to adjust it, it seems clear from the remarks of Prime Minister Kim Bu-gyeom that the current distancing will be eased.
Prime Minister Kim said last week, "I would like to inform you that I will make a courageous decision any time when it is determined that the severity and death rate are stable and the quarantine situation can be managed to some extent." I was on the show and said something similar.
Prime Minister Kim said, "I will make a decision within this week. I will decide between (small business owners and self-employed people) taking their breath away and not pouring oil into the process of Omicron's proliferation."
The current social distancing, which is in effect until the 20th, can be summarized as 'limited to 6 people at private gatherings, business hours are limited to 9pm', and it seems that measures with more relaxed meeting numbers and times will be announced on the 18th.
Preparing to ease the distance can be understood as a paradigm shift in quarantine.
Omicron mutation has become the dominant species and there are over 50,000 confirmed cases a day, but it means that we will focus on prevention and management of severe cases rather than controlling the number of confirmed cases anymore.
The fact that the number of seriously ill patients is as low as 200-300 and the utilization rate of critically ill beds is stably maintained at 20% would also have been taken into account.
"The quarantine pass needs to be maintained more"
It seems that the government has decided to maintain the quarantine pass (inoculation certificate, negative confirmation system) more.
At a regular briefing, Head Young-rae Son said, "Considering the cost-effectiveness of achieving the policy goal of minimizing severity and death, I think it is necessary to maintain the quarantine pass more than distance."
The government is of the view that the purpose and effect of the quarantine pass, which affects the entire population, and the quarantine pass, which mainly affects unvaccinated adults, are different.
I will upload the briefing contents of class head Young-rae Sohn.
The quarantine pass is mainly focused on preventing infection and transmission by unvaccinated people.
Currently, the quarantine pass is applied to those over the age of 18, and the current vaccination completion rate for those over the age of 18 is 95.9%, about 96%.
Only 4% of all adults over the age of 18 have not been vaccinated, so those who suffer inconvenience from the quarantine pass will be about 4% of these adults.
On the other hand, we have been announcing the proportion of unvaccinated among severe cases and deaths over the past 8 weeks. was the inoculation.
Therefore, blocking the infection and transmission caused by these unvaccinated people is becoming an important target to minimize the serious and fatal damage at present, and how to protect the 4% of the unvaccinated people continues to be a major issue. situation is becoming.
(..) Therefore, considering the cost-effectiveness of achieving the current policy goal to minimize severity and death in these areas, the effectiveness of the quarantine pass itself needs to be maintained more than distance.
Director Sohn said, "We plan to continue reviewing whether it is necessary to partially adjust (the quarantine pass) while looking at the overall quarantine system reorganization and the current epidemic situation." It's about reviewing what you're doing.
According to the government announcement, it seems that the QR code for the quarantine pass will be maintained.
However, there are cases where QR codes are used for the purpose of an access list, but that seems to be gone.
"QR code for the purpose of the access list is suspended"
Jung Eun-kyung, director of the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, appeared on KBS yesterday (14th) and said, "For epidemiological investigation, it is determined that the QR code used for the purpose of access list in multi-use facilities needs to be stopped." It hinted at the possibility of stopping.
Because the government has greatly relaxed the epidemiological investigation standards, such as abolishing the system that manages the movement of confirmed patients based on the location information system (GSP), the need for an access list to track contacts is not great.
Typically, marts asked for QR codes to manage people regardless of whether they were vaccinated or not, but this is highly likely to disappear.
However, since the government said that it will maintain more quarantine passes, the QR code for the quarantine pass will continue to be used.
There is no change in the need to scan a QR code when entering a restaurant that is supposed to receive customers based on whether or not they have been vaccinated.
The government is also said to be considering ways to separate the two purposes.
Home therapist prescription drugs, dispensed at all local pharmacies
There are some things that will change from tomorrow (16th). Home therapists will be able to get prescription medicines, such as antipyretics, at all local pharmacies.
However, 'Paxrovid', an oral (edible) treatment, can only be obtained from 472 pharmacies designated by each city, county, and gu, as now.
Making it available at all local pharmacies is a move to get drugs to home care providers more quickly.
As the number of mild and asymptomatic at-home treatment surged due to the spread of the Omicron mutation, the quarantine authorities classified high-risk groups such as those in their 60s or older as the 'intensive management group' from the 10th, and divided the others into the 'general management group'. We are monitoring our health twice a day.
Among home-care patients, the general management group can receive medical treatment and prescription over the phone at a local hospital or clinic if symptoms worsen. It is said to have increased.
Telephone consultation and prescription for home therapists Medical institutions, pharmacies, and short-term outpatient centers can be found on the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service website (http://www.hira.or.kr) and some local government websites.
The diagnosis of the quarantine authorities is that the new at-home treatment system and diagnostic test system have entered a stage of stabilization as the participating medical institutions expand and become familiar with the medical field.
"Rapid antigen test, difficult to replace with rapid PCR"
The quarantine authorities also took a position that it is difficult to replace rapid antigen testing with rapid PCR (gene amplification) testing.
Rapid PCR test has relatively high accuracy and can confirm results relatively quickly.
Rapid PCR is a test that can be directly analyzed on the spot as soon as a sample is collected and confirmed whether it is positive in about an hour. It is similar, but the examination time can be greatly reduced, so it is only used in emergency rooms or some local governments that need to urgently send patients to the operating room.
Son Yeong-rae, head of the Social Strategy Division at the Central Accident Response Headquarters, said, "Rapid PCR is used in emergency rooms, but it is difficult to expand because there is a great limit to increasing the quantity. Rapid PCR is a method that uses general PCR inspection resources together, and general PCR Unlike other methods, the pooling (collective diagnostic test) method cannot be used, so it is difficult to expand the quantity.”
► Pooling test (collective diagnostic test): This is a method designed to reduce the time required for testing. If multiple samples are mixed and tested, all samples are treated as negative, and if positive, each sample is tested separately to find the infected person. inspection method
"We can no longer cooperate with quarantine"
Self-employed people who have been severely hit by the prolonged distancing measures held a large-scale rally again. More than 200 members of the Corona Victim Self-Employment Coalition (Koja Chong), which consists of 14 small business groups including the Korea Food Service Federation, gathered in Gwanghwamun to discuss the abolition of business hours restrictions. They urged the preparation of practical compensation for the loss of the self-employed.
At the rally, the anger and demands of the self-employed erupted, and 10 self-employed people also shaved their heads. Let's see some of the remarks.
"We came out on the streets because of the right to live. Now the self-employed are being treated like criminals. Now we have to start over, but we have nothing, and we can't make a living with just a tiny bit of compensation. When we get 100% compensation for our losses I will fight until the end." (Co-CEO Oh Ho-seok of Koza Chong)
"Even the dogs I have at home told me to sit, so they give me snacks because they are pretty. For the past two years, if the government closed the doors, we closed the doors, and if we asked for fewer people, we got less. . Still, the government is mocking the self-employed as if they are giving subsidies. Let's end further cooperation with quarantine."
The self-employed will: ▲ Eliminate business hours restrictions ▲ Include loss compensation for self-employed people with sales of KRW 1 billion or more ▲ Apply loss compensation retroactively and realize 100% compensation ▲ Prepare separate support plans for Seoul and local governments ▲ Additional loss compensation for all businesses opened after the outbreak of COVID-19 He also delivered a policy proposal to the Blue House with contents such as
a piece of the day
Tomorrow (16th) is the 80th anniversary of the birthday of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il.
This is a picture of the congratulatory meeting of North Korean women's union officers and female members ahead of Kim Jong-il's birthday.
The event was held yesterday (14th) at the Women's Center, the North Korean Central News Agency reported along with this photo.