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| A patron at a restaurant in January scans a QR code on the restaurant's mobile screen to verify proof of vaccination status. Newsis |
Gov't lifts vaccine pass regulation on March 1 despite rising infections
By Ko Dong-hwan
The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) shut down the COVID-19 vaccine pass system on March 1, allowing people nationwide to enter restaurants, malls, supermarkets and other public venues without proving whether they have been vaccinated by scanning their QR codes upon entry.
It was one of the latest measures taken by the KDCA to mitigate the quarantine regulations that have been enforced so far.
The relatively low rate of critical cases caused by the now dominant Omicron variant and its increased contagiousness, which make it harder for the available medical workers to keep monitoring all patients, had preceded the introduction of the new measures.
The KDCA has shifted its quarantine strategy from "enforcing" to "advising" members of the public to stay safe, by continuing to wear KF-94 masks and adhere to the social distancing measures while in public.
Under the new rules, people can now participate in large public events with 50 or more participants without having to show proof of vaccination. Nonetheless, the existing maximum number of participants allowed in public events remains capped at 299. Health clinics no longer need to provide printed proof of a negative result to a COVID-19 test, and the vaccine passes for minors that were scheduled to be put into effect on April 1 have also been suspended under the new rules.
The KDCA said it has shut down the vaccine pass measure "temporarily," as it has shifted the focus to patients with a higher risk of complications while expecting the rest of the public be personally responsible for keeping themselves safe from infection.
The authority introduced the vaccine pass last November.
On Tuesday it also lifted the rules on the seven-day self-quarantine period for unvaccinated people who come into contact with infected patients.
The country reported 138,993 new infection cases on Monday. Those who fell critically ill per day reached a new record of 727. The authority expects that the daily figures will reach 230,000 by March 9 and then peak in mid-March at around 350,000.
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| A customer at a coffee shop scans a QR code at a device installed at the coffee shop's counter to present her vaccine pass before entry. Newsis |
The timing of the KDCA shutting down of the vaccine pass even before COVID-19 daily infection cases have yet to peak, has raised questions as to whether it was too premature. Some say it might be the government's move to curry favor with small- to medium-sized business owners ahead of the March 9 presidential election who have been losing patrons due to the pandemic and the government's quarantine measures.
Some medical experts said that the suspension of the vaccine pass will largely not have much of an effect on whether the public gets infected with COVID-19 because most members of the public have already been vaccinated twice.
"Nearly 95 percent of the public have been vaccinated with their second dose, and the country has continued to enforce the vaccine pass requirement so as to encourage people to get the third (booster) shot," Chun Eun-mi, a professor of respiratory medicine from?Ewha Womans University Mokdong Hospital told The Korea Times.
Chun said that the vaccine pass system has already lost its effectiveness because, despite getting the third shot, some people have still gotten infected with COVID-19.
"The risk can actually be greater when there are so many confirmed infections, because people can get infected nearly at the same time as they are receiving the booster shot," Chun said. "When a vaccinated person gets an immune reaction together with the infection reaction from the coronavirus together, his or her condition can get much worse," she explained. "During the Delta variant wave a couple of months ago I saw two patients who were in this situation when they got infected with that variant, and they developed pneumonia."
She said that those who were vaccinated with first two shots have memory cells in their bodies so that, even when they do get infected, the symptoms are less severe. "If you are healthy, the booster shot is really unnecessary," she said. "And I think the vaccine pass is no longer helpful so shutting it down was appropriate."
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