Schools reopen as South Korea seeks normality amid MERS outbreak

A passenger puts a masks on her son to prevent contracting Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) at the Incheon International Airport in Incheon, South Korea, June 14, 2015. [Photo/Agencies]

 

The Health Ministry said it would quarantine or put under observation about 4,000 people who may have been exposed to MERS at a prominent Seoul hospital, the Samsung Medical Center, which has suspended most services.

But many in that group are among the 5,216 already under quarantine, most of them at home and some in hospitals.

INCUBATION PERIOD

The Samsung hospital said on Sunday it was suspending all non-emergency surgery and would take no new patients after more than 70 cases were traced to it, including a worker who was found to have been in contact with more than 200 people.

Deputy Prime Minister Choi Kyung-hwan told parliament that the next two days would be a watershed period for the outbreak, as the two-week incubation period for the initial wave of cases traced to the Samsung hospital comes to an end.

Choi, who is also the finance minister, said the government was considering a possible supplementary budget to bolster the economy, Asia's fourth-biggest.

At Myoungin Elementary School in the city of Suwon, south of Seoul, teachers greeted students at the gate for the first time in 10 days, taking temperatures and sending home anyone with a fever.

The WHO last week recommended schools be reopened, saying they have not been linked to transmission of the virus in South Korea or elsewhere.

"The child's mother and I both work, so I think it's better for kids to be in school where there can be proper measures, rather than keeping them home," said Bin Ko-ok, who brought her first-grader grandchild to school.

South Korea said more than 110,000 group tourists had called off visits since the start of the outbreak, and forecast that from June through August 820,000 fewer people would visit, at a cost of $900 million in lost potential revenue.

The trend is expected to continue through the summer, the culture ministry said. Chinese airlines were cutting back flight to South Korea, Xinhua news agency reported.

South Korea's largest hypermarket chain, E-Mart Co Ltd , said online sales between June 1-11 had risen 63 percent year-on-year, as people avoided stores, while No.2 Homeplus's online sales between June 1-14 rose 50 percent.