South Korea confirmed 152 new coronavirus cases yesterday – a rise after a week of diminishing infection rates, and a reminder that the country is not yet out of the woods.
For the past few days, South Korea had been reporting fewer than 100 cases per day, raising hopes that the outbreak’s peak had passed.
Related: South Korea reports 110 new coronavirus cases, total hits 7,979
But new clusters have been identified; of the 152 new cases, 97 are from the city of Daegu, including 75 from one nursing facility, said Yoon Tae-ho of the Central Disaster Relief Headquarters today.
The government is “substantially cautious of the danger in the sense that sporadically cases are breaking out in nursing facilities and hospitals in clusters,” Yoon said. “Our biggest concern is that those in the nursing facility or hospital are suffering from an existing condition and had been in the facility for a long time. They are very old.”
About 80% of all the confirmed cases in South Korea are associated with cluster transmissions, the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Sunday.
South Korea now has 8,565 coronavirus patients, of which 91 have died, according to Johns Hopkins University, which is tracking cases reported by the World Health Organization and additional sources.
From CNN’s Jake Kwon in Seoul