Stronger measures warranted to prevent omicron, now dominant variant, from wreaking havoc

South Korea is in for another round of the COVID-19 crisis, as the highly transmissible omicron has officially become the dominant strain amid growing concerns over its potentially sweeping impact on high-risk groups and the already fragile health system. According to the government data released Monday, the detection rate of the omicron variant hit 50.3 percent in the past week. As omicron has emerged as the dominant COVID-19 variant, health authorities said they will shift gears and implement

NEC’s standing commissioner leaves on demand by entire staff

Cho Hai-ju, the standing commissioner of the National Election Commission, was going to stay on the commission at President Moon Jae-in’s request, but left it under its staff’s collective pressure. This is an unprecedented incident. Days before his term as the standing commissioner expires, Cho reportedly expressed an intention to leave the commission completely. But Moon was said to have requested he keep a nonstanding commissioner position after resigning as the standing commissi