S. Korea raises penalties for quarantine violators; up to one year in prison
- 4 years ago
오늘부터 자가격리 위반하면 '최대 징역 1년 또는 벌금 1천만원'
South Korea has managed to stabilize its number of new infections, and now it's working to prevent a second wave.
But there's an increasing risk from people who are ignoring their quarantine orders, so the government has announced severe new penalties for quarantine breakers.
Our Hong Yoo reports.
Starting Sunday, South Korea has introduced stricter punishments for those found violating the country's self-quarantine rules.
Before, it was a fine of up to 2-thousand-400 U.S. dollars.
But now, it's up to a year in prison or a fine of up to 8-thousand-100 dollars.
The same goes for anyone who lies when filling out health-related forms when entering the country.
The punishment was raised following a series of self-quarantine violations reported by local governments.
The rule has been that anyone showing symptoms of the coronavirus and anyone coming into contact with a patient has to self-quarantine for two weeks.
Since April, all people arriving from overseas have also been ordered to self-quarantine for two weeks.
Now, around 27-thousand people are under lockdown and among them 20-thousand are recent arrivals.
Of the 81 newly confirmed cases in South Korea on Sunday, 40 of them were imported.
24 of them were found upon arrival at the airport, but 16 were detected later.
The concern is these people could set off a second wave of infections, and the fact that some of them have been roaming around their communities has people worried.
South Korea anticipates that the extension of its social distancing campaign will decrease the number of new cases to fewer than 50 per day, and cases with unknown routes of transmission to less than 5 percent.
Hong Yoo, Arirang News.
South Korea has managed to stabilize its number of new infections, and now it's working to prevent a second wave.
But there's an increasing risk from people who are ignoring their quarantine orders, so the government has announced severe new penalties for quarantine breakers.
Our Hong Yoo reports.
Starting Sunday, South Korea has introduced stricter punishments for those found violating the country's self-quarantine rules.
Before, it was a fine of up to 2-thousand-400 U.S. dollars.
But now, it's up to a year in prison or a fine of up to 8-thousand-100 dollars.
The same goes for anyone who lies when filling out health-related forms when entering the country.
The punishment was raised following a series of self-quarantine violations reported by local governments.
The rule has been that anyone showing symptoms of the coronavirus and anyone coming into contact with a patient has to self-quarantine for two weeks.
Since April, all people arriving from overseas have also been ordered to self-quarantine for two weeks.
Now, around 27-thousand people are under lockdown and among them 20-thousand are recent arrivals.
Of the 81 newly confirmed cases in South Korea on Sunday, 40 of them were imported.
24 of them were found upon arrival at the airport, but 16 were detected later.
The concern is these people could set off a second wave of infections, and the fact that some of them have been roaming around their communities has people worried.
South Korea anticipates that the extension of its social distancing campaign will decrease the number of new cases to fewer than 50 per day, and cases with unknown routes of transmission to less than 5 percent.
Hong Yoo, Arirang News.