North Korea’s State Emergency Anti-epidemic Command (SEAC) recently issued an order to disease control agencies throughout the country warning that a “major crisis point” in the COVID-19 crisis could come in June or July.
A Daily NK source in North Hamgyong Province said Wednesday that SEAC issued the order to provinces, cities and counties nationwide on May 26. Predicting a major crisis point in June or July, the order called on people to stay sharp, warning that “work in all sectors must not fall behind.”
According to the source, the order primarily emphasized that since party and state agencies, enterprises, farms, universities and all other sectors were experiencing crises due to the “infectious disease,” people must push forward with quarantine measures and keep doing their work “without retreating.”
Above all, the order called on people to finish up work on the farms during the “optimal period,” calling farming a “task that cannot be delayed.” It also called for construction projects, plans to develop the civilian economy, and school classes to continue without interruption.
“The government called on people to remember that if they neglect to wear masks because it’s hot in summer, the virus could spread sharply and infections could accelerate,” said the source. “It also called for the balanced redeployment of medical professionals from big hospitals to clinics and quarantine stations so that they will be able to respond quickly to outbreaks during the summer.”
The order demanded that health workers treat other infectious diseases going around each province “as the state would take responsibility for drugs and disinfectants,” he added.
The order also called for everyone to coalesce under unitary government command to “stabilize the social atmosphere” by September through strong efforts to bring down the fever infection rate.
In particular, the order called on quarantine authorities to closely watch people who have been in quarantine and to categorize them as “people with immunity.” Quarantine authorities were also ordered to ensure that people who again come down with fevers remain in quarantine for just three days instead of the standard ten.
Additionally, the order called on the authorities to establish a clear system separating the quarantined and the re-quarantined, and to keep track of the ratio of quarantine cases that have fully recovered so that life can return to a less restrictive “normal quarantine system” in each province by September.
“The government predicts infections to be widespread primarily in June and July and secondarily until September, and called on each province to simultaneously prepare for a prolonged medical battle and quickly transition to a normal quarantine system,” the source said.
SEAC also called for swift measures to combat seasonal diseases so that they do not make matters worse.
The source said the order concluded by telling provincial quarantine agencies and officials to think of present times as a “test platform,” warning that “if a stronger strain enters the country, they will need to wage a new struggle once again.”
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
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