ⓒYONHAP News

The government has decided to ease the cap on private gatherings to ten from the current eight and relax the 11 p.m. curfew on business hours for restaurants and cafes to midnight.

Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum announced the decisions on Friday during a government meeting on COVID-19 responses in Seoul.

The revised social distancing rules will take effect from Monday and remain in place for two weeks until April 17.

The facilities subject to the extended business hours include nightlife establishments, karaoke rooms, indoor sport facilities, internet cafes, movie theaters and concert halls.

The government reportedly plans to lift all social distancing measures when the current wave is definitely confirmed to have passed its peak and the decline becomes clear.

The prime minister said if the government reduces the number of critical patients and deaths and maintains stable management of the medical system for the next two weeks, it would implement drastic reforms of social distancing measures next time.

The latest move came after the government on Thursday began vaccinating children aged five to eleven.

According to the state vaccination task force, vaccination of the age group, estimated to number over three million, began at about 12-hundred medical institutions across the nation.

Children must be accompanied by their parents or legal guardians to be vaccinated.

The standard vaccination course schedules two pediatric doses of Pfizer's vaccine eight weeks apart, but they may get the second dose three weeks after the first if they have medical or personal reasons.