CRI听力:S. Korea to Track Cellphones of People under MERS Quarantine

The continued rise in confirmed cases of the MERS virus in South Korea is prompting authorities to take additional action to prevent it from spreading beyond those who have already been quarantined.

South Korean Deputy Prime Minister Choi Kyung-hwan says this will include the monitoring of the roughly 2-thousand people who are being isolated.

"We plan to track the mobile phones of people under quarantine. Please understand this is an unavoidable measure for the sake of our neighbours and families."

A 75-year-old man has become the latest confirmed fatality from MERS.

He died on Friday.

However, health officials only confirmed this Sunday that he was infected with the MERS virus.

The delay in getting the information out is said to be generating public anger in South Korea, with a growing number of people pointing the finger at the government for failing to control the situation.

South Korean Health Minister Moon Hyung-pyo has been on-record admitting the administration 'dropped the ball' when the virus was first confirmed in the country.

"Despite the government's endeavour to block the infection after the first confirmed MERS case on May 20, the number of MERS patients is growing. I am truly sorry for the current situation in which the number of MERS patients is increasing at a rapid pace due to our belated track down and isolation of the first confirmed patient and thus our inability to block in-hospital infection early."

The first case of MERS in South Korea was diagnosed on May 20th after a 68-year-old man returned from a business trip to the Middle East.

So-called 'patient zero' and his wife have both since recovered and have been released from hospital.

Deputy Prime Minister Choi Kyung-hwan is calling on people, and the markets, not to begin panicking, particularly ahead of the opening of the South Korean Stock Exchange, the KOSPI, on Monday.

"We are requesting the cooperation of all people to restrain from overreacting which may shrink the economic activities and actively support the government's various events at home and abroad. We will take all pre-emptive measure to minimise the negative impacts on our economy."

First identified in 2012, MERS is a corona virus similar to SARS.

However, MERS has a higher mortality rate of around 40-percent.

Of the over 12-hundred confirmed cases around the world, around 450 people have died from the virus.

For CRI, I'm Wang Mengzhen.