SEOUL (XINHUA) - South Korea reported 3,187 new cases of Covid-19 as of midnight Tuesday (Nov 16) compared to 24 hours ago, raising the total number of infections to 402,775.

The daily caseload surged from 2,124 in the previous day, marking the country's second-highest daily number since the first case was found in January last year.

The recent resurgence was attributed to cluster infections in the Seoul metropolitan area.

Of the new cases, 1,432 were Seoul residents. The number of newly infected people residing in Gyeonggi province and the western port city of Incheon was 956 and 157, respectively.

The virus spread also raged in the non-metropolitan region. The number of new infections in non-capital areas was 618, or 19.5 per cent of the total local transmission.

Twenty-four cases were imported from overseas.

The number of infected people who were in a serious condition was 522, up 27 from the previous day.

Twenty-one more deaths were confirmed, leaving the death toll at 3,158. The total fatality rate stood at 0.78 per cent.

Since the mass vaccination was launched on Feb 26, the country has administered Covid-19 vaccines to a total of 42,062,748 people, or 81.9 per cent of the total population.

The number of fully vaccinated people was 40,243,219, or 78.4 per cent of the population.