250,000 Student COVID-19 Cases Nationwide in One Week... 120,000 Decrease Compared to Previous Week

250,553 Student Confirmed Cases in the Past Week
Decline for 3 Consecutive Weeks Since Peak in 2nd Week of March
Students Undergo an Average of 2.1 Tests Before Attending School

[Asia Economy Reporter Han Jinju] The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases among students has entered a downward trend over the past week. The nationwide number of confirmed student cases has decreased by 120,000 compared to the previous week, now standing at 250,000.

According to the Ministry of Education on the 6th, from March 29 to April 4, the total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases among nationwide kindergarten, elementary, middle, and high school students was 250,553, with a daily average of 35,793 cases.

The weekly number of confirmed student cases decreased by more than 120,000 compared to the previous week (371,660 cases). The daily average number of confirmed student cases also decreased by about 17,000.

Student cases have been declining since the third week of March. The number of confirmed student cases peaked at 409,148 in the second week of March (March 8?14), then decreased to 408,943 in the third week (March 15?21), and further to 371,660 in the fourth week (March 22?29).

The cumulative number of confirmed student cases this semester up to April 4 is 1,712,076.

The number of confirmed cases among faculty and staff in the past week is 25,043. The cumulative number of confirmed faculty and staff cases this semester is 146,130.

As of the 4th, out of 20,329 schools nationwide, 19,354 schools (95.2%) conducted full in-person classes. Schools with partial in-person and partial remote classes numbered 887 (4.4%), and schools conducting fully remote classes numbered 20 (0.1%).

Among students attending in-person classes as of the 4th, 90.2% (2,999,000) out of 5,874,130 students attended. The attendance rate increased by 5.5 percentage points compared to 84.7% on the 14th.

Rapid antigen tests before attending school were conducted an average of 2.1 times for students and 1.7 times for faculty and staff during March 21?27. An analysis linking rapid antigen test results with confirmed case data from the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency showed a positive predictive value averaging 86.42%.

The positivity rate was higher among students at 5.41% compared to 3.93% among faculty and staff. By school level, elementary students had the highest positivity rate at 5.93%.

The Ministry of Education explained, "Through the linkage of rapid antigen tests and PCR tests over seven days, approximately 150,000 confirmed cases were detected early, and recommendations for school attendance suspension were issued."

Among students participating in the self-diagnosis app, 86.33% (5,065,913) took part, and among them, 2.35% (137,676) were advised to refrain from attending school due to symptoms or awaiting test results.

The number of confirmed university student cases in the past week was 15,503, and confirmed faculty and staff cases were 2,360.