North Korea says coronavirus situation stable

Seoul, Aug 5 (EFE).- North Korea announced Friday that the country’s coronavirus situation has reached a definitive “phase of stability,” with no new cases reported in the previous week and all those getting treatments having recovered.

According to the state-run Korea Central News Agency (KCNA), the official emergency anti-epidemic agency identified no new “fever” cases across the country from Wednesday to Thursday evening.

North Korea, which reported its first case of Covid-19 on May 12, went seven days without detecting any new infection.

“As no new fever cases were reported during the past week and all those receiving treatment have recovered across the country, the overall anti-epidemic situation of (North Korea) has entered a definite phase of stability,” the news agency said.

The KCNA said all sectors and units “redouble their efforts to maintain perfection in executing state anti-anti-epidemic policies and measures.

On Thursday, the official media said the country had reported an overall 4.77 million infections, of which 99.9 percent had recovered.

The virus has claimed 74 lives, per the official data. It represents a mortality rate of 0.002 percent in a country that has kept its borders tightly closed since the pandemic began.

The low mortality compared to other countries has put a question mark on the credibility of the official data, with the World Health Organization asking the regime to share more concrete statistics.

South Korean intelligence services believe that many of the “fevers” identified by the North as suspected coronavirus cases could be other diseases, such as measles or typhoid fever.

North Korea has rejected offers of health aid, including vaccines, from Seoul and the United States.

But according to the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI), Pyongyang may have accepted vaccines from China. EFE

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