TOKYO: Japan's Foreign Ministry on Sunday raised its travel alert related to the COVID-19 new coronavirus to Level 3 for the southern South Korea city of Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province in the eastern part of the country.

The number of people infected with the virus per population of 10,000 is high in the city and the province, according to the ministry.

Level 3, which advises people to cancel trips, has already been in place for the inland China province of Hubei, the epicenter of the virus, and the city of Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, eastern China, where a COVID-19 outbreak is also serious. Level 3 is the second highest on the ministry's four-tier travel warning system.

For other parts of South Korea the ministry kept its alert at Level 1, which calls for enough caution.

On Sunday, the ministry also raised the COVID-19 alert to Level 2, which calls for avoiding trips that are not urgent, for three north Italian regions--Lombardy, Veneto and Emilia-Romagna--due to spreading outbreaks of the virus there.

JIJI Press