국내 코로나 97명 확진, 거리두기 5단계…마스크•출근•등교•종교활동 어떻게 바뀌나
Our top story this lunchtime.
South Korea is reporting an additional 97 COVID-19 cases on this Monday.
It's back under one hundred for the first time in 6 days.
Most were locally transmitted and most centered in and around Seoul.
The government has also announced a new social distancing measure scheme, which aims to better reflect the situation on the ground.
Kim Yeon-seung has the details.
The South Korean government on Sunday announced its new five-stage social distancing measures.
"We are dividing the social distancing rules further... from three levels into five... to better reflect reality. We are also redesigning our disease prevention measures in a tailored fashion,... to make them more effective."
The five-level system will take effect from Saturday, November 7th.
The government will take into account the weekly average of daily COVID-19 cases to decide which level of social distancing measures will apply.
Level one social distancing measures apply on a regional basis if the daily average is below 100 cases in the capital area, or below 30 in other regions.
If there are more than 100 daily cases on average in the capital region, the rules will be raised a notch to level 1-point-5.
If there are over 300 cases nationally, the whole country will be put under level 2 measures.
400 to 500 national cases will prompt level 2-point-5 measures.
And between 800 and 1-thousand daily cases will result in level 3 measures.
The new measures also intend to provide some relief to local businesses that have been suffering the most due to the pandemic.
For example, PC rooms had previously been categorized as a high-risk facility, and under level 2-point-5 rules, they were forced to temporarily shut down.
The new measures separate facilities into those that need intensive monitoring, and those that require normal monitoring.
PC rooms are categorized as the latter, so they are now allowed to operate even under level 2-point-five, just not after 9 PM.
And under level 2 measures, PC rooms can fully operate as long as they have barriers between the seats and visitors wear masks indoors.
Kim Yeon-seung, Arirang News
