Number of critically ill patients, deaths from COVID-19 forecast to grow further

위중증·사망자 급증..."정점 이후 2~4주까지 사망자 증가"... 코로나 위험도 '매우높음' 최고단계 Right... Soa... thank you... for the global tallies... over the past 24 hours. As mentioned earlier... concerns are mounting... over... the persistent rise... in the number... of severe infections... as well as... fatalities. For more... Choi Min-jung ... is here... in the studio. Min-jung... good... to have... you... here. Thank you for having me, Sunny. Min-jung... the sheer scale... of the current outbreak... appears... to be driving... up... ICU tallies... and... related losses... of lives? That's right Sunny,... with cases continuing to surge,... authorities are bracing for a further uptick... in the number of severely-ill patients as well as deaths. As Soa mentioned,... with more than 50 added on Tuesday,... we saw over a thousand critically-ill patients,... and authorities say this figure could potentially rise... to more than 2-thousand 7-hundred. We've also been seeing... triple-digit death tolls... on a daily basis,... higher than what we witnessed at the end of last year... when Delta was the dominant strain. Authorities are expecting even more fatalities... 2 to 4 weeks after the Omicron wave hits its peak. On that note,... health authorities continue to stress... that Omicron doesn't pose a serious health threat... to people who've gotten their booster shots. Recent data showed... that the fatality rate of Omicron... hovered at point-0-7 percent... for people who received an extra dose. This is similar to that of the seasonal flu,... which is known to be fatal... in around point-0-5 percent to point-1 percent... of all cases. Authorities pointed out... that the death rate for unvaccinated people however,... is at point-6 percent,... which is six times that of the seasonal flu. Also,... not a single Omicron death has been reported... among people under 60... who got their boosters. Meanwhile,... for people who are 60 and over,... the death rate was seen at point-5-2 percent,... but still much lower than unvaccinated people in this age group,... which stands at around 5-point-5 percent. I see. Meanwhile... despite... the ease... in social restrictions... I hear... health authorities... have raised... the country's COVID-19 alert level... to its highest... on the FIVE-TIER system? Right Sunny. The country's COVID-19 risk level... has been bumped up to "very high"... following last week's developments. This, as you said,... is the highest in the five-tier ladder. And it's the first time in nine weeks... that this alert level has been issued. The KDCA chief explained... that the upgrade is due to the fact... that more ICU beds are now filled... at above 50 percent of total capacity,... and with the number of deaths expected to rise... with more people over 60 getting infected. This also comes... as recent data has shown... that the Omicron strain accounted for nearly one-hundred percent... of our new cases. Of these,... the sub-variant of Omicron... also known as "stealth" Omicron... accounted for 23 percent of domestic cases,... and the figure doubled within just a couple of days. Studies so far... have shown that the "stealth" variant... is 30 percent more transmissible than Omicron,... with no meaningful differences... in health outcomes... and the effectiveness of vaccine protection. And... concerns are also being raised... over infections... among students... at school? Right, the virus is spreading rapidly among teenagers and even among young children,... especially in the capital region. Over the past week, over 27-thousand students were infected in Gyeonggi-do Province,... and more than 25-thousand cases were reported in Seoul. The new school semester began with more than 84 percent of schools in the capital holding in-person classes,... but this figure dropped to 66 percent on Monday. With the virus spreading quickly among the faculty as well,... education authorities are allowing teachers to lead classes from home,... to address any learning gaps. In principle, teachers who are infected must go on leave,... but now they will be able to teach students remotely... if their symptoms are mild. Right... Min-jung. Thank you... for now. Do stay... for mor talks. #COVID19 #infection #patients 📣 Arirang News(Facebook) :   / arirangtvnews   📣 Arirang News(Twitter) :   / arirangtvnews   📣 News Center(YouTube) :    / newscenter_arirangtv   2022-03-08, 14:00 (KST)