SEOUL, Dec. 3 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s military will strengthen quarantine measures for troops returning from vacation and start a booster shot program earlier than planned amid growing fears of the omicron variant, officials said Friday. Starting Monday, the military plans to put returnees in quarantine until they test negative for COVID-19 twice. The [...]
SEOUL, Dec. 3 (Korea Bizwire) – Travelers returning home Friday from short-term overseas trips were embarrassed to learn that they must self-isolate at home for 10 days under the government’s emergency quarantine rule announced only two days earlier to stem the spread of the omicron COVID-19 variant. The 10-day mandatory quarantine for all inbound travelers [...]
SEOUL, Dec. 1 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea decided Wednesday to reimpose strict passenger screening at airports, mandatory quarantine and other measures to prevent the spread of the emerging omicron variant of COVID-19 after reporting the first such cases in the country. A married couple in their 40s, living in Incheon, west of Seoul, and [...]
SEOUL, Oct. 29 (Korea Bizwire) — All-night Halloween parties and celebrations will not be possible at restaurants, cafes and other multiuse facilities this weekend, as the government decided Friday to enforce relaxed social distancing rules starting Monday morning due to COVID-19 fears. Ahead of this year’s Halloween, which falls on Sunday, health authorities are struggling [...]
SEOUL, Oct. 22 (Korea Bizwire) – Three quarters of South Koreans agree with the need to shift to the “living with COVID-19″ scheme, a poll said Friday, as the government is moving to phase out coronavirus restrictions under the new policy next month. According to the survey conducted early this month on 1,083 people aged [...]
SEOUL, Oct. 20 (Korea Bizwire) — The National Human Rights Commission of Korea has on Tuesday ruled that distributing personal information of a COVID-19 patient during the quarantine process is a violation of the patient’s right of publicity, right to reputation and privacy. The individual in question, an employee at a local department store, was [...]
SEOUL, Oct. 8 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea and Singapore agreed Friday to exempt or ease vaccinated travelers from mandatory quarantine upon arrival, in a major step to help revitalize people-to-people exchanges between the two sides in the midst of the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic, according to related ministries here Friday. Under the measure, effective from [...]
SEOUL, Sept. 17 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s health authorities said Friday they have decided to allow fully-vaccinated arrivals from more countries to skip a mandatory 14-day quarantine starting October. Beginning next month, the mandatory quarantine policy will be applied on arrivals from 20 nations, down from the current list of 36 countries, according to [...]
JINCHEON, Sept. 10 (Korea Bizwire) — Hundreds of Afghan evacuee families under South Korean protection on Friday got a chance to enjoy the outdoors and fresh air for the first time since their arrival here, following the end of a mandatory self-isolation protocol against COVID-19. Last month, the Seoul government evacuated 390 Afghan co-workers and [...]
SEOUL, July 15 (Korea Bizwire) — Local governments in charge of antivirus measures at popular summer vacation destinations are on high alert for a massive influx of vacationers from the greater Seoul area and other regions hit by a surge of COVID-19 cases. South Korea’s daily new coronavirus cases have been in excess of 1,500 [...]