Photo/Illutration Senior students wait for class to begin with plastic boards placed on their desks at Jeonmin High School in Daejeon, South Korea, on May 20. (Yonhap via AP)

South Korea has reported 20 new cases of the coronavirus, including nine in the densely populated Seoul metropolitan area, as authorities scramble to stem transmissions as they proceed with a phased reopening of schools.

The figures announced by the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday brought national totals to 11,142 cases and 264 deaths. Nine other fresh cases were linked to international arrivals.

South Korea was reporting around 500 new cases a day in early March but has since managed to stabilize infections with aggressive tracing and testing. Officials have eased social distancing measures and began reopening schools, beginning with high school seniors on Wednesday.

But students at dozens of schools in Incheon, near Seoul, were sent back home after some of them tested positive after visiting a karaoke room or taking private classes from a virus carrier.

On May 27, it will be high school juniors, middle school seniors, elementary first- and second-graders and kindergartners. Further reopenings are scheduled on June 3 and 8.

Health Minister Park Neung-hoo during an anti-virus meeting on Friday pleaded that people avoid visiting karaoke rooms or computer gaming centers near schools to lower infection risks for students.

Meanwhile, South Korean health authorities are reviewing the possible use of Apple and Google’s new smartphone technology that automatically notifies users when they’d come close to infected people.

But officials also say it isn’t clear whether the Bluetooth-based apps would meaningfully boost the country’s technology-driven fight against COVID-19, where health workers have aggressively used cellphone data, credit-card records and surveillance footage to trace and isolate potential virus carriers.

The software released by Apple and Google--a product of a rare partnership between the industry rivals--relies on wireless Bluetooth technology to detect when someone who downloaded the app has spent time near another app user who later tests positive for COVID-19.

South Korea’s infectious disease law allows health authorities quick access to a broad range of personal information when fighting epidemics, which includes medical and credit-card records and location information provided by police and cellphone carriers. That information used in an aggressive test-and-quarantine program has so far allowed South Korea to weather the outbreak without economic lockdowns.

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