The number of COVID-19 cases linked to the Sarang Jeil Church in Seoul reached 315 on Monday amid the rapid spread of the virus through churches in the greater Seoul area.

Vice Health Minister Kim Gang-lip said on Monday in a press briefing that out of some four-thousand people on the list of church members, about two-thousand have been tested and 312 tested positive for the virus.

Kim added that as 16 percent of the tested people were positive, this indicates the need to conduct swift testing and quarantine measures on church members. 

He added that about 34-hundred members were placed under quarantine. 

The vice minister said authorities are having difficulty due to an inaccurate membership list, urging people from the church who participated in the Liberation Day demonstration or who have symptoms to quickly get tested. 

Kim said the cases from the church had reached 312, but the Seoul Metropolitan Government confirmed there were 315 cases.