SEOUL – South Korea on Wednesday reported a daily record of 90,443 new coronavirus cases, as numbers nearly doubled within a week amid the spread of the highly infectious Omicron variant.

The record count for Tuesday marked a drastic surge from 57,177 a day before and brought total infections in the country since the pandemic began to 1,552,851. Deaths remain comparatively low, though, with 39 fatalities on Tuesday and a total of 7,202 so far, according to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA).

The country of 52 million population has largely been a COVID-19 mitigation success story, thanks mainly to widespread wearing of masks, social distancing and aggressive testing and tracing.

But authorities have shifted testing and tracing policy, in line with the less fatal Omicron variant’s spread, toward self-monitoring and diagnosis and at-home treatment starting this month.

Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum said the government was considering easing the current strict distancing curbs which include a 9 p.m. curfew for restaurants, cafes and bars, and a ban on gatherings of more than six vaccinated people.

More than 86% of South Koreans have been fully vaccinated and 58% have received a booster shot, KDCA data showed. – Reuters

HONG KONG – China’s President Xi Jinping has told Hong Kong‘s government to stabilize and control a deepening COVID-19 outbreak in the global financial hub as soon as possible, pro-Beijing media reported on Wednesday.

The directive increases pressure on authorities scrambling to keep pace with a deluge of new infections in the financial hub.

Xi instructed Chinese Vice Premier Han Zheng to relay to Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam his “concern about the pandemic situation” and his care for local residents, according to front page stories in newspapers Wen Wei Po and Ta Kung Pao.

Both media, which typically support Beijing’s interests in Hong Kong, said Xi made the remarks recently but did not specify where he was speaking.

The stories come a day after Lam said her government’s response to the Omicron outbreak had not been satisfactory, with hospitals and medical staff overwhelmed.

Lam, who has not confirmed whether she will seek another five-year term as head of the Chinese-ruled city, said she could “not preclude” the possibility of postponing next month’s chief executive election.

No heavyweight contender has yet declared their candidacy, a highly unusual situation just five weeks before the election.

COVID infections have surged 20 times on a daily basis since the start of February and Lam has said authorities can no longer keep up with testing and isolation mandates.

Dozens of patients were being treated in makeshift open air spaces outside medical centers on Tuesday as several hospitals operated at over 100% capacity.

Health authorities reported 1,619 confirmed infections on Tuesday, a daily record, and another 5,400 preliminary positive cases.

Xi said the government “must mobilize all power and resources to take all necessary measures to ensure the safety and health of the Hong Kong people and ensure the stability of the society in Hong Kong,” according to the newspapers.

Hong Kong has recorded around 26,000 infections since the start of the pandemic, including just over 200 deaths, far fewer than other similar sized major cities.

However, medical experts have warned cases could surge to 28,000 daily by the end of March amid worries about high levels of vaccine hesitancy among the elderly. – Reuters

Sea levels around the United States will rise up to a foot over the next 30 years due to climate change, as much as they have risen in the previous century, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) projected in a report on Tuesday.

The study forecasts that sea levels along the U.S. shoreline will rise 10-12 inches (25-30cm) on average by 2050. Sea levels will tend to be higher along the Atlantic and Gulf shores, because of greater land subsidence there, than along the Pacific coasts.

In addition to more frequent bouts of coastal inundation associated with storm surges, rising sea levels are leading to increasing episodes of flooding from high tides alone.

Damaging coastal floods typical of today’s sea levels, weather conditions and infrastructure are expected to occur more than 10 times as often in the next 30 years, Nicole LeBoeuf, director of NOAA‘s National Ocean Service, said in a summary of the report.

“I can tell you with complete confidence that these are not the kind of changes that we grew up with,” said LeBoeuf, a native of the Texas Gulf Coast.

The study, designed as a planning tool to mitigate and adapt to rising sea levels predicted, has a high degree of certainty over the next three decades, regardless of any efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions that are warming the planet, NOAA officials said. But NOAA suggests additional sea level increases further into the future could be curtailed by tougher action to lower greenhouse gas emissions.

“This new data on sea rise is the latest reconfirmation that our climate crisis ⁠— as the president has said ⁠— is blinking ‘code red,'” Gina McCarthy, the White House national climate advisor to U.S. President Joe Biden, said in the study’s summary.

The NOAA report, prepared in collaboration with several federal agencies, draws on a combination of tide gauge measurements, satellite observations and analysis from the latest report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to determine sea level rise projections around the country.

NOAA officials said the report builds on and supports previous findings from the IPCC and other entities about sea level rise, which experts say is caused primarily by melting ice sheets and glaciers as global temperatures increase. – Reuters