Seoul: According to a report released on Wednesday, North Korea has ordered a five-day lockdown in the capital due to "respiratory illness". These appear to be the first citywide restrictions since the country declared victory over COVID-19 in August 2022.
Pyongyang residents have been ordered to stay inside their homes from Wednesday to Sunday and will undergo multiple temperature checks daily, according to a government notice cited by Seoul-based specialist site NK News.
The report said that while the common cold was listed among the diseases currently running in the capital, the notice did not specifically mention COVID-19.
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The government order comes a day after NK News reported that residents of the city appeared to be stockpiling goods in anticipation of the lockdown, according to sources in Pyongyang.
The extent of any additional lockdown is unknown, and government media have not reported any new regulations. According to experts, the capital city of North Korea is most likely to contain COVID-19.
According to Go Myeong-hyun, a researcher at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies, not only in North Korea but all over the world, Covid is "disappearing and reappearing depending on the temperature".
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With temperatures in Pyongyang dipping as low as -22°C, the Korean Peninsula is currently experiencing what meteorologists have dubbed a Siberian cold snap.
Go told AFP it was too early for North Korea to declare victory over the virus as it had recently come back with a drop in temperatures. North Korea must have made some preparations for this, but it seems that the virus returned earlier than expected.
China, a major trading partner and neighbor of North Korea, recently abandoned its zero-Covid policies due to an outbreak of infections spreading to hospitals and cremation grounds.
Since the start of the pandemic, North Korea has maintained a strict blockade, but it allows some trade with China. Three months after the first COVID-19 outbreak, which North Korea acknowledged in May last year, the country declared victory over the virus, calling it a "miracle".
Experts have long disputed Pyongyang's Covid figures and assurances of containing the outbreak, including from the World Health Organisation.
According to experts, North Korea has one of the world's worst health care systems, with underfunded hospitals, few intensive care units and no drugs to treat COVID-19. Despite rumors to the contrary, it is not believed to have immunized any of its 25 million residents, although it may have imported some vaccines from China.