Out of an abundance of caution, USFK will maintain Health Protection Condition Charlie despite South Korea relaxing their social distancing and preventive measures today.

 

While the current COVID-19 conditions in South Korea are heading in the right direction with confirmed cases consistently remaining near single digits, and the vast majority coming from off the peninsula, USFK assessed that it is still too early to let down its guard as the risk and threat of COVID-19 to the force remains.

 

“The Republic of Korea has done an amazing job, and we are going to let them take the lead as they relax some of their social distancing measures,” said Gen. Robert B. “Abe” Abrams, USFK Commander. “We’ll watch and see how these new measures play out over the next week or so, and then if the current conditions are maintained, we’ll move forward with relaxing our preventative measures as well, to include moving to HPCON Bravo.”

 

USFK holds daily meetings with health professionals and senior leaders across the force to monitor, assess and make recommendations to the USFK commander regarding the current COVID-19 environment.

 

To date, the USFK community has been remarkably vigilant and committed to following the control measures put in place to protect the force as evident by USFK’s extremely low infection rate of less than .001%.

 

“We’ve got a mission to accomplish, and we’ve got to keep our force healthy,” said Abrams. “Our requirement to ‘Fight Tonight’ hasn’t gone away, and that’s why we’re moving ahead with an abundance of caution before we relax our preventive health conditions.”

 

USFK remains committed to providing a robust combined defense posture while maintaining a “Fight Tonight” readiness to protect the Republic of Korea against any adversary or threat while implementing and maintaining prudent preventive control measures to protect the force.

 

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