GO out, socialize and have fun, South Korea’s government told its people, declaring the start of “a new daily life with COVID-19” — while keeping a vigilant eye out for any sign of backsliding, any need for restrictions to snap back into place.

It didn’t take long.

On Saturday, just the fourth day of the new phase, the mayor of Seoul ordered all the capital’s bars and nightclubs shut down indefinitely after the discovery of a cluster of dozens of coronavirus infections.

South Korea initially attacked the pandemic with such success that it became a model cited worldwide, all but halting a large outbreak without choking off nearly as much of its economy as other nations have. Now it is attempting something just as difficult: moving gradually, safely closer to something resembling everyday life.

Other nations, eager to reopen but fearful of the consequences, will be watching closely to see what happens in South Korea.

“A second wave is inevitable,” said Son Young-rae, a senior epidemiological strategist at the government’s Central Disaster Management Headquarters. “But we are running a constant monitoring and screening system throughout our society so that we can prevent it from exploding rapidly into hundreds or thousands of cases like the one we had in the past.”

South Korea has had nearly 11,000 confirmed cases of the virus and reported 256 deaths. But it has slowed the spread from several hundred new infections recorded daily in late February and early March, to around 10 per day in recent weeks.

So far, 27 cases have been found among the club-goers and people who had close contact with them, Kwon Jun-wok, a senior disease-control official, said during a news briefing Saturday.

The mayor, Park Won-soon, cited a higher figure, saying that at least 40 infections had been linked to the nightclubs. As he closed the clubs, he scolded patrons who had failed to practice safeguards like wearing masks, accusing them of putting the entire nation’s health at risk.(SD-Agencies)