North Korea announced on Friday that hundreds of families have contracted an unknown bowel disease, which could lead to increased pressure on declining and depleted healthy sleep, which has been largely depleted since the Corona outbreak.
Pyongyang has declared a “maximum emergency” over the recent coronavirus outbreak, and state media have reported that more than 4.5 million people have contracted the “fever,” as authorities have called “Covid 19,” and 73 people have died.
This week, the official Korean Central News Agency reported a new “severe intestinal outbreak” in the southwestern province of Hwanghae, and leader Kim Jong-un urged officials to “contain the epidemic as soon as possible.”
In what may be an indication of the seriousness of the situation, Kim Yo-jong, the sister of the North Korean leader, was among the senior officials who personally donated medicines for the relief effort, it was officially announced.
And the Korea Central News Agency said on Friday that medicines will be distributed to “more than 800 families suffering from this serious epidemic that has spread in parts of South Hwanghae province.”
This number means that at least 1,600 people have contracted the disease.
This information prompted speculation that this unspecified disease may be cholera or typhoid fever.
If the outbreak is confirmed, it could exacerbate the country’s chronic food shortages, as South Hwanghae Province is one of North Korea’s main agricultural regions.
Experts have warned of a dangerous health situation in the country in the event of the spread of coronavirus, as its healthcare system is one of the worst in the world.
“Given the dilapidated medical infrastructure in the North, acute intestinal disease could spread at any moment,” South Korean news agency Yonhap quoted a spokesperson for the unification ministry in Seoul as saying.
AFP, citing a source, said that Seoul expressed its willingness to help North Korea cope with the spread of a new epidemic.
South Korea has already offered to send vaccines/assistance to North Korea in the fight against the coronavirus epidemic, and Pyongyang has not officially responded to these offers.
