|
 South Korean authorities closed nearly 2,000 schools and said fewer
than 10 people who had broken quarantine rules were located and
taken back home. In a couple of cases, they were located through
cellphone tracking.
Malaysia advised its nationals to avoid South Korea and Singapore
postponed or cancelled all school trips to the country, although the
head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said she believed Seoul
would be able to control the further spread of the virus by taking
appropriate measures.
The Health Ministry announced 23 new infections, bringing the total
to 87. South Korea now has the second highest number of infections
in the world after Saudi Arabia, according to data from the European
Centre for Disease Prevention and Control.
The latest MERS patient to die in South Korea was hospitalised for
pneumonia when he was infected, officials in the city of Daejeon
said. He was confirmed to have contracted the virus from another
patient at a hospital.
Underlining concern about the spread of the disease, South Korean
authorities said they would track the cellphones of about 2,500
people under quarantine who may have been in contact with patients.
Some of those under quarantine are in healthcare facilities although
most are at home.
Jeong Eun-kyeong, a South Korean disease control center official,
said local health officials and police were keeping tabs on those
quarantined.
"We are actively tracing their locations, cooperating with police or
using other methods. We did cellphone tracking in a couple of cases.
For contacts we must find, we will request location tracking and
receive data," Jeong told reporters.
Local health officials have found some people, fewer than 10, who
had broken quarantine and taken them back home, Jeong said, adding
that those who break the rules can be fined.
A team of experts from the WHO was due to begin work on Tuesday to
evaluate the response to the outbreak, including why it had spread
so fast and advise on further measures.
The South Korean culture of families looking after their loved ones
at hospitals may have been part of the reason for it to spread
within healthcare facilities, WHO Director-General Margaret Chan
told Yonhap news agency.
All known South Korean infections have taken place within healthcare
facilities, where it is common for family and friends to make
lengthy visits, sometimes around the clock.
The WHO has not advised any travel restrictions.
RATE CUT?
South Korean Finance Minister Choi Kyung-hwan said he was concerned
over the impact on its already flagging economy from the MERS
outbreak. In remarked prepared for delivery at a luncheon, he said
the government would take swift countermeasures if an economic
impact was confirmed, but he stopped short of mentioning any
possibility of a supplementary budget.
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The MERS outbreak is adding pressure for another interest rate cut
in South Korea, possibly as soon as the central bank's next policy
meeting this week.
The South Korean government, under criticism for a lack of
transparency and failing to respond swiftly to the outbreak,
identified 24 health facilities where MERS patients have been
present, including six where infections are known to have occurred.
Reflecting public concern among parents, 1,869 schools across the
country were due to be closed on Monday, the Education Ministry
said.
Malaysia's deputy Health Minister Hilmi Yahaya said citizens were
advised not to travel to South Korea, but no ban had been imposed.
All school trips from Singapore to South Korea had been postponed or
cancelled, Singaporean media reported at the weekend, citing the
Ministry of Education.
The quarantine office at Japan's Narita Airport, which serves Tokyo,
said announcements were being made on planes from South Korea that
anybody who might have been in contact with a MERS patient or been
in a hospital with MERS patients needed to report to quarantine
officials.
In China, airports stepped up monitoring of incoming passengers and
are requiring airlines to report any cases of passengers with high
temperatures.
First identified in humans in 2012, MERS is caused by a coronavirus
from the same family as the one that triggered Severe Acute
Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS. SARS killed around 800 people
worldwide after it first appeared in China in 2002.
South Korea's new cases bring the total of MERS cases globally to
1,236, based on World Health Organization (WHO) data, with at least
445 related deaths.
(Additional reporting by Rujun Shen in SINGAPORE and Elaine Lies in
TOKYO; Editing by Tony Munroe and Raju Gopalakrishnan)
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