North Korea reports 15 more suspected COVID-19 deaths

People watch a TV screen showing a news report about the COVID-19 outbreak in North Korea, at a train station in Seoul, South Korea, Saturday, May 14, 2022. North Korea on Saturday reported 21 new deaths and 174,440 more people with fever symptoms as the country scrambles to slow the spread of COVID-19 across its unvaccinated population. (Ahn Young-joon / AP)

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea has confirmed 15 more deaths and hundreds of thousands of additional patients with fevers as it mobilizes more than a million health and other workers to try to suppress the country's first COVID-19 outbreak, state media reported Sunday.

After maintaining a widely disputed claim to be coronavirus-free for more than two years, North Korea announced Thursday that it had found its first COVID-19 patients since the pandemic began.