Seoul, South Korea Oct 7 (BNA): The World Health Organization is working to ship COVID-19 medical supplies to North Korea, in a possible sign that North Korea is easing one of the world’s strictest pandemic border closures to receive outside help.
The World Health Organization said in a weekly monitoring report that it has begun shipping essential COVID-19 medical supplies through the Chinese port of Dalian for “strategic storage and sending more” to North Korea. On Thursday, WHO officials did not immediately respond to requests for more details, including what those supplies were and whether they had reached North Korea yet.
Describing its anti-virus campaign as a matter of “national presence,” North Korea has imposed severe restrictions on cross-border traffic and trade over the past two years despite straining its already faltering economy, the Associated Press (AP) reported.
UN human rights investigators in August asked the North Korean government to clarify allegations that it had ordered troops to shoot any intruders crossing its border, in violation of its epidemic lockdown.
While North Korea has yet to report a single case of COVID-19, outside experts widely suspect that it has escaped the disease that touches nearly every other place in the world.
North Korea told the World Health Organization that it had tested 40,700 people for the coronavirus as of September 23 and that all tests had been negative. Of those tested in the past week who were reported, 94 people had influenza-like illnesses or other symptoms and 573 were health care workers, according to the WHO report.
Experts say an epidemic in North Korea could be devastating, given the poor health care system and chronic shortages of medical supplies.
But despite implementing strict border controls, North Korea has not shown the same kind of urgency for vaccines even as a mass vaccination campaign continues to be postponed amid global shortages.
Analysts say North Korea may be uneasy about the international monitoring requirements that will be attached to the vaccines it receives from the outside world. There are also views that leader Kim Jong Un has domestic political motives to tighten the country’s self-imposed lockdown as he calls for unity and is trying to consolidate his grip on power while going through perhaps his most difficult moment after nearly a decade in power.
The latest WHO report came weeks after Kim, during a ruling party meeting, ordered officials to crack down on a tougher anti-virus campaign “our way” after he rejected some foreign COVID-19 vaccines provided through the UN-backed immunization programme.
UNICEF, which buys and provides vaccines on behalf of the COVAX distribution programme, said last month that North Korea had proposed allocating about 3 million injections of Sinovac to hard-hit countries instead.
Some analysts say North Korea is looking to take more effective strikes amid questions about the effectiveness of the Sinovac vaccine.
UNICEF said North Korea’s Ministry of Health said it will continue to communicate with COVAX about future vaccines.
RAE