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Seoul — North Korea Claimed on Friday that the country's first outbreak of COVID-19 began with a patient who touched an "alien" near the border with South Korea, apparently blaming neighbors for a wave of infection in an isolated country. is.
Announced the results of the investigation, North Korea ordered people to "carefully deal with winds and other climatic phenomena and foreign things caused by balloons in the borders and areas along the borders." , Said the official KCNA news agency.
Authorities did not mention South Korea directly, but North Korean defectors and activists have been crossing highly fortified borders from the south for decades. He flew a balloon and carried leaflets and humanitarian aid.
The South Korean Ministry of Unification, which deals with the Global North and Global South, said the virus "is unlikely" to invade the north through leaflets sent across borders.
According to KCNA, 18-year-old soldiers and 5-year-old kindergarten children who came into contact with unidentified materials "on the hills around barracks and residential areas" in the eastern county of Mt. Kongo in early April were symptomatic. Was later tested positive for coronavirus.
KCNA stated that all other cases of fever reported in the country by mid-April were due to other illnesses, but did not elaborate.
"Scientifically speaking, it's hard to believe North Korea's claim, given that the virus is very unlikely to spread through objects," the university said. Professor Yang Mujin said. Of North Korean studies in Seoul.
According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the risk of people being infected with COVID by contact with contaminated surfaces or objects is possible, but generally considered low.
North Korea also said that the first two patients touched an unspecified object in an eastern town in early April, but for the first time this year a group of North Korean defectors crossed the border into a balloon. Was known to have been sent since late April. West Kanaura region.
The first occurrence of COVID was recognized in North Korea after the border blockade that was enforced to resume freight train operations with China from the beginning of 2020 was eased. It was a month later.
However, it would have been difficult for Pyongyang to point his finger at China, said Professor Lim Ulchul of the Far East Institute of Gyeongnam University.
"If they concluded that the virus was from China, they would have had to strengthen quarantine measures in the border area to further reduce trade between North Korea and China. "Mr. Lim said.
North Korea claims that the wave of COVID is showing signs of calming, but experts suspect underreporting of numbers released through government-controlled media.
North Korea reported more than 4,570 fever symptoms on Friday, with a total of 4.74 million fever cases recorded since late April.
Pyongyang has published a daily number of fever patients without identifying whether they were infected with COVID, apparently due to a lack of test kits. (Report by Soo-hyang Choi and Josh Smith, edited by Leslie Adler, Richard Chang, Raju Gopalakrishnan)
