The first case of COVID-19 in South Korea was announced on 20 January 2020. The number of confirmed cases increased on 19 February by 20, and on 20 February by 58 or 70, giving a total of 346 confirmed cases on 21 February 2020, according to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA), with the sudden jump mostly attributed to "Patient 31" who participated in a gathering at a Shincheonji Church of Jesus the Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony church in Daegu.
Amidst fears of further contamination, mass gatherings in the affected cities were cancelled and about 300 soldiers in Daegu were placed in isolation. On 4 February 2020, in order to help prevent spread of the disease, South Korea began denying entry to foreigners traveling from Hubei Province in China.
South Korea introduced what was considered one of the largest and best-organised epidemic control programs in the world, along with Singapore, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Various measures were taken to mass test the population for the virus, and isolate any infected people as well as trace and quarantine those they had contact with, without any further lockdown. The rapid and extensive testing undertaken by South Korea was initially successful in limiting the spread of the outbreak, without using the drastic measure of locking down entire cities. A significant rise in the number of new infections began in August 2020, with clusters being linked to Protestant churches in the Seoul Metropolitan Area. Another rise began in the third week of November, and Seoul entered a third wave of infections. On 24 November, the government raised the social distancing level in Seoul to level 2. On 29 November, the social distancing level in other areas of the country was raised to 1.5. In December, it was raised to level 2.5 in some metropolitan areas and 2 in other areas.
In early 2022, there was a major spike in cases related to the Omicron variant, with 170 thousand cases reported on February 22. South Korea began relaxing social distancing rules on 4 March 2022, and announced a shift toward endemic living on 18 March. It lifted its vaccine mandate and quarantine requirement for fully vaccinated travelers on 1 April. The number of new daily reported cases peaked at 621,317 on 16 March 2022, and the number of daily deaths peaked at 432 on 29 March 2022.
Timeline
During the first four weeks, South Korea controlled the potential spread of COVID-19 by using high-tech resources like tracking the use of credit cards and checking CCTV footage of confirmed patients. After 18 February, the number of cases increased to more than 1,700 after discovering that patient number 31 was a member of the Shincheonji Church of Jesus. Some media reported that it was difficult for KCDC to screen the patient because Shincheonji teaches that illness is sin, and that members were uncooperative with KCDC and were out of reach. Shincheonji denied this, and other sources report that the sect did cooperate with the authorities. About half of confirmed cases were linked to the Shincheonji Church as of 27 February; this was verified by health officials. As of 10 March, the KCDC was able to contact and test most of the Shincheonji Church members, with the total number of tests nationally standing at around 200,000.
20 January – 17 February 2020
On 20 January, a 35-year-old Chinese woman was confirmed as the first case. The first South Korean national to be infected occurred three days later, a 55-year-old man who worked in Wuhan, China, and returned for a checkup with flu symptoms. The two infection reports were publicly released on 24 January.
On 26 January, a 54-year-old South Korean man was the third case. He had used a rental car and visited three restaurants, a hotel, a convenience store and met his family before admitting himself to hospital. All these places were disinfected. On 27 January, a fourth case was reported as a 55-year-old South Korean man who returned from Wuhan on 20 January. He first experienced flu symptoms on 21 January and developed further complications four days later, eventually turning himself in. Both cases were tallied into formal records on 27 January.
On 1 February, an update on the first four patients was received. It indicated that the first three were showing weaker symptoms and recovering well while the fourth was being treated for pneumonia. Rumours circulated that the fourth patient had died, while the health authorities denied the rumours.
Two more confirmed cases were reported on 30 January. The fifth patient was a 32-year-old South Korean man who returned from his work at Wuhan on 24 January. The sixth patient was the first case in South Korea who had never visited Wuhan. The 56-year-old man caught the virus when visiting a restaurant with the third patient.
On 31 January, a seventh patient was reported as a 28-year-old South Korean man returning from Wuhan on 23 January. He developed symptoms on 26 January 2020 and was admitted to hospital on 28 January. On the same day, four more patients were admitted into the record. The eighth patient, a 62-year-old South Korean woman, returned from Wuhan. The ninth patient caught the virus from the fifth patient through direct contact. The tenth and the eleventh patients were the wife and child of the sixth patient, who became infected while visiting him.
On 1 February, a 49-year-old Chinese national working in Japan as a tour guide was confirmed as the twelfth patient. He caught the virus while visiting a Japanese patient in Japan and entered South Korea through Gimpo International Airport on 19 January. The KCDC confirmed an additional three cases on 2 February, bringing the total to fifteen.
A woman who had returned from a five-day vacation in Thailand tested positive and was confirmed as the sixteenth case on 4 February. Three more cases were confirmed on 5 February, taking the total to 19. The seventeenth and nineteenth patients had attended a conference in Singapore and been in contact with an infected individual there. The same day the KCDC announced that the second patient had been released from hospital after testing negative in consecutive tests, becoming the country's first coronavirus patient to fully recover.
On 15 February, a workshop for fitness dance instructors was held in Cheonan. By 9 March, dance classes at 12 sport facilities were associated with 112 cases of COVID-19. 30 of the cases were asymptomatic at the time of laboratory confirmation. 50.9 percent of cases were from instructors to fitness class participants, 33.9 percent were transmissions to family members by instructors or class participants, and 15.2 percent were during meetings with acquaintances or coworkers.
18 February – 29 February
On 18 February, South Korea confirmed its 31st case in Daegu, a member of the Shincheonji religious organisation. The patient continued to go to gatherings of Shincheonji days after showing symptoms, which are typically held with people in very close proximity and include physical contact of the members. Many of the patient's close contacts would turn out to be infected, triggering a drastic escalation of the South Korean spread of confirmed cases of SARS-CoV-2 infection.
On 19 February, the number of confirmed cases increased by 20. On 20 February 70 new cases were confirmed, giving a total of 104 confirmed cases, according to the KCDC. KCDC attributed the sudden jump of 70 cases linked to "Patient No. 31", who had participated in a gathering in Daegu at the Shincheonji Church of Jesus the Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony.
On 20 February, the streets of Daegu were empty in reaction to the Shincheonji outbreak. A resident described the reaction, stating "It's like someone dropped a bomb in the middle of the city. It looks like a zombie apocalypse." The first death was reported in a mental ward of Cheongdo Daenam Hospital in Cheongdo County. According to the mayor of Daegu, the number of suspected cases as of 21 February was 544 among 4,400 examined followers of the church. The hospital was suspected as the source of an outbreak after it was visited by a woman who became the second fatal case of South Korea on that day. Upon investigation, it was determined that the infection had spread to that hospital through a funeral ceremony attended by members of the church.
All South Korean military bases were on lockdown after three soldiers tested positive for the virus. Airlines cut connections and cultural schedules were canceled due to fears of further spread. United States Forces Korea raised the alert level from low to moderate and cut off non-essential travel to and from USFK Daegu. USFK Daegu's school facilities were closed and non-essential personnel were ordered to stay at home while any visitors going there were not allowed to enter. USFK announced that the widow of a retired soldier who was in Daegu was diagnosed to be positive for the virus on 24 February. Camp Humphreys enacted virus detection protocols, including temperature checks and raised the alert level to high. On 26 February, an American soldier based at Camp Carroll was diagnosed to be positive and was quarantined away from bases via off-base housing unit with contact tracing done that showed his movements to Camp Walker.
As of 22 February, among 9,336 followers of the church, 1,261 reported symptoms. At the time, 169 confirmed cases involved the same church and another 111 came from the Cheongdo Daenam Hospital. 23 February saw another 123 cases with 75 being from Shincheonji and 24 February saw 161 additional cases with 129 being from the same religious group. Over 27,000 people were tested for the virus with 19,127 negative results.
On 24 February, 15 countries imposed travel restrictions to and from South Korea. It was reported that a senior health official overseeing the COVID-19 efforts in Daegu tested positive and was also a member of Shincheonji. Within a few days, a petition to the nation's president urging for the disbandment of the church had over 750,000 signatures. Their headquarters in Gwacheon was raided by law enforcement and government officials said all 245,000 members of the religious group would be found and tested.
On 28 February, over 2,000 confirmed cases were reported.
March
On 2 March, there were over 4,200 confirmed cases. With an additional 4,000 cases of COVID-19 within two weeks, and roughly 60% of the total infections nationwide having stemmed from the church, the government of Seoul asked prosecutors to press charges against the religious group's founder and senior members for murder, causing harm, and for violating the Infectious Disease Control and Prevention Act. Interviews were held with all 230,000 members of the religious group and nearly 9,000 were said to be showing symptoms of the virus. Due to the number of infections in the country, ninety-five countries banned or limited entry for South Korean passport holders. Testing was also conducted at drive-through testing sites where patients did not leave their vehicles, but were met by medical personnel in hazmat suits over several stations. The process was completed in a few minutes and results available in several days.
On 8 March, KCDC in South Korea announced that 79.4% of confirmed COVID-19 cases were related to group infection. KCDC also announced that outbreak associated with Shincheonji Church totaled 4,482 infections, accounting for 62.8% of the total confirmed cases.
13 March was the first time since the outbreak on 20 January in which the number of recoveries, 177, was larger than the number of those who newly tested positive, 110. The cluster of cases in the Seoul Capital Area, raised fears that infections could rise sharply.
The controversy about Shincheonji also continued and generated international interest. After the lawsuit started by the Mayor of Seoul, the police raided the church premises to check whether the list of members supplied by Shincheonji pursuant to a request by the authorities was, as the Mayor argued, not complete. The authorities checked the list seized during the raid with the one Shincheonji had supplied and concluded that discrepancies were minor.
The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) expressed concern that religious freedom rights of Shincheonji members may have been violated in South Korea by "exaggerating the church's role in the outbreak", and stated that, "USCIRF has received reports of individuals encountering discrimination at work and spousal abuse because of their affiliation with the church." USCIRF reported that South Korean "Vice Minister of Health Kim Kang-lip has publicly stated that the Shincheonji church has cooperated with authorities." The Belgian NGO Human Rights Without Frontiers and CESNUR released a "White Paper" claiming that, although it did make "mistakes" in its management of the crisis, Shincheonji had also been discriminated against because of its status as an unpopular group in South Korea.
On 17 March, around 79 church devotees were infected with the virus after attending the River of Grace Community Church. The infections were claimed to have been caused by spraying salt-water into followers' mouths, under the belief that this would protect them from the virus. Nearly 140 churches in Gyeonggi Province, which surrounds Seoul and is part of the Seoul Metropolitan Area, were threatened with closure if they did not implement preventive measures, including temperature checks, two-meter separation, and the wearing of masks. As more churches were holding services despite a government order for social distancing, on 30 March, the controversial Manmin Central Church in Guro, Seoul became a cluster with 22 infections linked to a gathering in early March in which the group was preparing stock footage to use for online worship services. Other church clusters appeared in the cities of Suwon, Busan, Geochang, and Bucheon.