South Korean officials are stepping up efforts to ensure that people stick to social distancing guidelines during Halloween, warning that this year’s celebrations “could really turn scary,” as it tries to avoid another resurgence in COVID-19 infections.
Officials have been patrolling nightclubs in Seoul to make sure that people adhere to social distancing rules and are advising people to host Halloween parties online, Seoul public health director Park Yoo-mi said yesterday.
“Don’t end up a real ghost while enjoying Halloween,” reads one Seoul Government-issued poster.
Photo: AFP
Another warned that this year’s party “could really turn scary.”
South Korea has been praised for quick and effective action against the COVID-19 pandemic, but in May saw a resurgence in cases after an outbreak linked to nightclubs and bars in Seoul.
The city government has dispatched officials and police to 153 nightclubs ahead of this weekend to make sure that facilities follow strict guidelines and visitors log in names and use quick response (QR) code systems for contract tracing, Park said.
Fourteen nightclubs in the city have already been shut after failing to adhere to social distancing guidelines and for hosting more people than they are allowed to, Park said.
“The city plans to reap immediate results from prevention measures by ordering a two-week ban on gatherings for the facilities that violate the guidelines,” she added.
Park urged other businesses to join the 85 night venues in the city which have said that they would voluntarily shut their doors during Halloween to protect against the spread of COVID-19.
South Korea has used aggressive testing and contact tracing to contain the virus, which has nationwide infected 26,385 people and killed 463, Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency data showed.
The agency has over the past few weeks confirmed about 100 new cases every day.
SUPPORT: Elon Musk’s backing for the far-right AfD is also an implicit rebuke of center-right Christian Democratic Union leader Friedrich Merz, who is leading polls German Chancellor Olaf Scholz took a swipe at Elon Musk over his political judgement, escalating a spat between the German government and the world’s richest person. Scholz, speaking to reporters in Berlin on Friday, was asked about a post Musk made on his X platform earlier the same day asserting that only the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party “can save Germany.” “We have freedom of speech, and that also applies to multi-billionaires,” Scholz said alongside Estonian Prime Minister Kristen Michal. “But freedom of speech also means that you can say things that are not right and do not contain
Ukraine’s military intelligence agency and the Pentagon on Monday said that some North Korean troops have been killed during combat against Ukrainian forces in Russia’s Kursk border region. Those are the first reported casualties since the US and Ukraine announced that North Korea had sent 10,000 to 12,000 troops to Russia to help it in the almost three-year war. Ukraine’s military intelligence agency said that about 30 North Korean troops were killed or wounded during a battle with the Ukrainian army at the weekend. The casualties occurred around three villages in Kursk, where Russia has for four months been trying to quash a
FREEDOM NO MORE: Today, protests in Macau are just a memory after Beijing launched measures over the past few years that chilled free speech A decade ago, the elegant cobblestone streets of Macau’s Tap Seac Square were jam-packed with people clamouring for change and government accountability — the high-water mark for the former Portuguese colony’s political awakening. Now as Macau prepares to mark the 25th anniversary of its handover to China tomorrow, the territory’s democracy movement is all but over and the protests of 2014 no more than a memory. “Macau’s civil society is relatively docile and obedient, that’s the truth,” said Au Kam-san (歐錦新), 67, a schoolteacher who became one of Macau’s longest-serving pro-democracy legislators. “But if that were totally true, we wouldn’t
TRUDEAU IN TROUBLE: US president-elect Donald Trump reacted to Chrystia Freeland’s departure, saying: ‘Her behavior was totally toxic, and not at all conducive to making deals Canadian Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland on Monday quit in a surprise move after disagreeing with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau over US president-elect Donald Trump’s tariff threats. The resignation of Freeland, 56, who also stepped down as finance minister, marked the first open dissent against Trudeau from within his Cabinet, and could threaten his hold on power. Liberal leader Trudeau lags 20 points in polls behind his main rival, Conservative Pierre Poilievre, who has tried three times since September to topple the government and force a snap election. “It’s not been an easy day,” Trudeau said at a fundraiser Monday evening, but
RSS