North Korea claims close to end of Covid crisis amid fresh surge in Asia

The World Health Organization has cast doubts on North Korea's reports, saying last month it believed the situation was getting worse, not better, amid an absence of independent data.

Daily new cases of fever in North Korea reported by KCNA have been declining since the country first acknowledged in mid-May that it was battling an outbreak of Covid-19.
AP

Daily new cases of fever in North Korea reported by KCNA have been declining since the country first acknowledged in mid-May that it was battling an outbreak of Covid-19.

North Korea has said it is on the path to "finally defuse" a crisis stemming from its first acknowledged outbreak of Covid-19, while its Asian neighbours battle a fresh wave of infections driven by Omicron subvariants.

"The anti-epidemic campaign is improved to finally defuse the crisis completely," the state news agency KCNA said on Monday. 

It added that the country had reported 310 more people with fever symptoms.

The North says 99.98 percent of its 4.77 million fever patients since late April have fully recovered, but due to an apparent lack of testing, it has not released any figures of those that proved positive.

The World Health Organization has cast doubts on North Korea's claims, saying last month it believed the situation was getting worse, not better, amid an absence of independent data.

Lacking a public vaccination effort, the North said it was running intensive medical checks nationwide, with daily PCR tests on water collected in borderline areas among the measures.

The North also said it has been developing new methods to better detect the virus and its variants, as well as other infectious diseases, such as monkeypox.

READ MORE: North Korea confirms tens of Covid deaths

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Infections surge in Asia

North Korea's claim of "anti-epidemic stability" comes as other Asian countries grapple with a new wave of infections.

China reported 691 new cases on Saturday, with locally transmitted infections at a peak since May 23.

In the neighbouring South, daily infections jumped on Tuesday above 40,000 for the first time in two months, with authorities and experts predicting hundreds of thousands of new cases in the coming weeks.

Japan also warned that a new wave of infections appeared to be spreading rapidly, as Prime Minister Fumio Kishida called for special care ahead of school summer vacations.

Tokyo's 16,878 new cases on Wednesday were the highest since February, while the nationwide tally rose above 90,000, in a recent surge of infections to levels unseen since early this year.

READ MORE: China’s Shanghai to carry out two new rounds of mass Covid testing

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