The government said Monday that it plans to introduce oral Covid-19 treatments developed by multinational pharmaceutical companies next February.
"We have decided to secure oral Covid-19 drugs to treat 404,000 people and will begin introducing the treatments in stages from February next year," Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency Spokesperson Koh Jae-young said.
It was the first time that the government had announced the specific timing of the introduction of oral Covid-19 treatments. On Oct. 20, KCDA Commissioner Jung Eun-kyeong said at a parliamentary panel that she hoped to introduce the Covid-19 drugs early next year.
To implement the "living-with-Covid" system, the government has been pushing hard to pre-purchase medications to minimize the number of severe patients. The government signed a purchase agreement for 200,000 Covid-19 treatments with MSD in September and 70,000 treatments with Pfizer in October, respectively. The purchase of the other 134,000 doses is being discussed with MSD, Pfizer, and Roche.
Government officials expect to finalize the contract within this month.
"It will be necessary to discuss whether there is a need for additional purchases, considering the trend of confirmed cases and the approval for use by the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety," Koh said,
In another move to facilitate the return to normal life, the health authorities plan to speed up their provision of booster shots.
They cited a foreign study that showed the additional vaccination could lower the risk of death and severe symptoms compared to those who received only the basic vaccination.
According to the Corona 19 Vaccination Response Promotion Team, a recent study published by a team in Israel in "Lancet," an international medical journal, at the end of last month showed that those who received the booster shots had a 93 percent lower risk of infection and complications than those who received the booster dose five months earlier.
Also, the risk of the infection exacerbating to severe was 92 percent lower, and the risk of death was 81 percent lower.
According to the quarantine authorities, 312 of the 1,441 patients with severe symptoms over the past eight weeks come from those vaccinated. More than 80 percent of patients with severe cases and more than 90 percent of cumulative deaths are older adults over 60.
Although the vaccination completion rate in the elderly population has reached around 90 percent, many show significantly lowered antibody defense abilities over six months after completing vaccination.
As authorities have expressed concerns about a possible surge in confirmed cases and critically ill patients after implementing the "living-with-Covid" scheme, they have been keeping a close eye on the participation rate of booster vaccinations in high-risk groups, such as the elderly, with weakened immunity.
As of midnight Monday, a total of 350,000 people, including 140,000 older adults, had completed the booster vaccination.
"We are reviewing expert opinions and foreign data," said Hong Jung-ik, an official at the Covid-19 Vaccination Response Promotion Team. "As evidence accumulates, we believe that we should actively review the issue of accelerating the booster vaccination schedule by about a month."
The government has vaccinated 41,520,134 people – 11,110,293 with the AstraZeneca vaccine, 22,317,485 with Pfizer's vaccine, 1,489,386 with Janssen's vaccine, 6,600,810 with Moderna's vaccine – with the first shot of the vaccine up 2,160 from the previous day.
As of Monday, 76.6 percent of Koreans were fully vaccinated, while 80.9 percent have received their first shots.
Meanwhile, Korea's new coronavirus cases fell below 2,000 for the first time in six days as fewer people took virus tests over the weekend.
The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) reported 1,760 new virus cases, including 1,733 local infections, raising the cumulative caseload to 381,694 as of midnight Monday. Thirteen more people died from the virus, raising the death toll to 2,980 with a fatality rate of 0.78 percent.
Korea has kicked off the first of the three-stage "living-with-Covid" scheme to gradually phase out quarantine restrictions as more than 70 percent of the population completed their vaccination.
Under the latest measure, effective for four weeks, it will lift all restrictions on the business hours of cafes, restaurants, and other businesses, except for nightlife establishments. It also raised the private gathering limit to 10 people for the greater Seoul area.
However, it will strictly reinforce the vaccine pass system on high-risk facilities, such as indoor sports facilities, bars, and nightclubs. The vaccine pass requires visitors of such multi-use facilities to have a vaccination certificate or negative test result.
With the grace period for the vaccine mandate ending for most facilities on Monday, officials will fine and penalize both owners and visitors of such facilities that violate vaccine pass guidelines.