A local health expert predicted that Korea might experience “a midsize resurgence” of Covid-19 in the latter half.
"Korea may see a medium-scale epidemic in the second half of this year," Professor Cheong Jae-hoon of the Department of Preventive Medicine at Gachon University College of Medicine said during a symposium hosted by the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) on Wednesday.
Considering that the duration of the dominant strain lasts for three to four months, a mid-scale epidemic may appear in the second half of this year, 10 to 14 weeks after the outbreak of the stealth Omicron variant (BA.2), Cheong said.
Professor Cheong said the nation should reduce the severity of the mutation through conventional vaccination or natural infection. However, he noted that the new strain might have a better ability to evade immunity and higher transmission power. "It is necessary to prepare for the resurgence by correctly calculating the reinfection rate, vaccine effectiveness, and the effects of Covid-19 pills,” Cheong said.
He urged the government to do its best to protect the vulnerable group by making the most of its post-mortem records of Covid-19 deaths and risk assessment data for infants, pregnant women, kidney dialysis and organ transplant patients, and single-person households.
Chung Eun-ok, a mathematics professor at Konkuk University, also forecasted the “autumn resurge” would come around early November, causing a cumulative death toll of 700 to 2,700, depending on vaccination rate and virus restrictions, based on his analysis of big data.
The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) confirmed 111,319 new virus cases on Wednesday, raising the cumulative caseload to 16,583,220.
The death toll came to 21,520, up 166 from the previous day, with a fatality rate of 0.13 percent. However, critically ill patients came to 808, down 26 from a day ago.
The drops in new virus cases and severe patients follow the government's lifting of most quarantine rules, except for the mask mandate, a major step toward returning to pre-pandemic life from Monday.
Under the eased rules, small businesses can operate without constraints on hours, and people can meet without any limit on the sizes of private gatherings.
The government said it would consider whether to lift the outdoor mask mandate next week.
"It is still very important to wear a mask," Minister of the Interior and Safety Jeon Hae-cheol said. "A decision will be made on whether to continue wearing a mask outdoor in early May after a thorough evaluation of the quarantine situation and collecting expert opinions."
The government has said the indoor mask-wearing requirement would be unavoidable for "a considerable time." Still, it will decide whether to lift the mask mandate in less-risky outdoor places after monitoring the Covid-19 situation over the two weeks following the abolition of social distancing rules.
According to the minister, the government will also suspend state restrictions on the hosting of large-scale festivals in line with the recent lifting of social distancing requirements.
"The operation of the review and approval system on festivals participated in by more than 300 people will temporarily be suspended," he said.
As cases decrease, quarantine officials also stressed that they are reviewing whether to use only polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests as a testing method.
The government is currently using both PCR and rapid antigen tests to confirm patients after infection cases spiked, which, in turn, put a burden on the country's limited medical resources.
"If the prevalence decreases in the future, the positive predictive rate of rapid antigen tests will likely decrease," said Son Young-rae, head of the social strategy team in the Central Disaster Management Headquarters. "In such a case, the accuracy of the rapid antigen test will become lower."
Therefore, it is necessary to review whether the government will consider positive rapid antigen tests as an official Covid-19 confirmation, Son added.
As of Wednesday, 33 million people have received booster shots, or 64.4 percent of the country's population. The number of fully vaccinated people also came to 44.53 million, representing 86.8 percent of Koreans, the KDCA said.