BA.5 wave gathers strength for summer spread

Social Affairs

Published: 12 Jul. 2022, 16:50

BA.5 wave gathers strength for summer spread

People queue to be tested for Covid-19 at a testing center in Gangnam District, southern Seoul, on Tuesday. [YONHAP]

Korea added 37,360 new Covid-19 cases Tuesday, the most in two months, as the BA.5 wave grows.

The Omicron subvariant BA.5 accounted for 35 percent of cases in the past four weeks, health authorities said Tuesday.

“BA.5 cases are growing rapidly now, and we know that the subvariant tends to spread more rapidly compared to the existing BA.2 cases,” said Lim Sook-young, a senior official of the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA), in a meeting with the press on Tuesday.

“BA.5 is thought to be behind many re-infection cases because of its immune evasion ability,” she said.

BA.5 cases accounted for 70 percent of imported cases last week, although they were far smaller than locally transmitted cases.

The KDCA said the BA.5 subvariant was found to be at least 35 percent faster in its infection rate compared to BA.2 or the Stealth Omicron subvariant, which was the dominant subvariant from late-March.

The Omicron wave, which peaked in mid-March with over half a million cases a day, hit a low of 3,423 on June 27, before climbing again in recent weeks.

The count on Tuesday, of which 37,100 were domestic and 260 imported, was 2.1 times the count one week ago and 3.8 times the count two weeks prior.

The count on Tuesday was the highest since May 11's 43,908.

The KDCA said it hasn’t found evidence yet as to whether BA.5 is deadlier than previously subvariants.

Seven people died of coronavirus infection from Monday to Tuesday, bringing total Covid-19 deaths to 24,668 with a 0.13 percent death rate, said the KDCA.

There were 74 patients in critical condition and 7.8 percent of the intensive care unit beds were occupied throughout the country as of Tuesday, according to KDCA.

Of those who died of Covid-19 in the first week of July, 96.8 percent were in their 60s or older.

The surge in cases is expected to continue and be fueled by the holiday season from mid- or late-July to early August.

“Now that all social distancing measures have been lifted and the amount of movement and social activities have increased ... we expect these factors to contribute to a remarkably rapid spread,” Lim said.

Immunity is waning among large swathes of the population, she said.

“There are people who have received third or fourth vaccine shots since we began the vaccine program last year,” Lim said. “But in general, we’ve entered a period of reduced immunity levels for most of the vaccinated.”

A total of 65 percent of the country’s population had received a first booster shot as of July 3 according to the KDCA, which was higher than 37.2 percent in the United States or 59.2 percent in France as of late June, according to the World Health Organization.

Second booster shots were offered from April to high-risk groups, including people 60 or older or with underlying illnesses.

A nationwide campaign for second booster shots has not yet taken place.

BY ESTHER CHUNG [chung.juhee@joongang.co.kr]