S.Korea extends social distancing curbs

South Korea will extend its social distancing curbs by two weeks as the government contends with outbreaks nationwide and more people fall severely ill, Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum says.

The government tightened restrictions last week across most of the country before the country's peak summer holiday period.

Seoul and surrounding regions have banned private gatherings of more than two people after 6pm and any gatherings of more than four people are prohibited in the rest of the country.

Kim said on Friday the restrictions were crucial to stamping out cases and ensuring a safe reopening of schools in two weeks.

Health experts had called for tougher social distancing rules as the number of severe COVID-19 cases has doubled in three weeks, driven largely by young, unvaccinated people and a slow vaccination drive.

With the spread of the more transmissible Delta variant, a rise in movement of people despite the restrictions, and mobilised health personnel focused on the vaccination drive rather than contact tracing, epidemiological work seemed to have struggled to catch up, Lee Soon-young, president of the Korean Society of Epidemiology, told Reuters in an e-mail.

The country has administered at least one shot to 40 per cent of its 52 million population, while 14.7 per cent have been fully vaccinated, Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency data shows.

It aims to push up that number to 70 per cent by next month.

The KDCA on Friday reported 1704 cases for Thursday, bringing the total to 207,406 infections, with 2113 deaths.