South Korea reported one-thousand-630 new COVID-19 cases on Friday, staying above the one-thousand mark for the 17th consecutive day.  

The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency(KDCA) said on Friday that the new infections compiled throughout the previous day raised the country's cumulative caseload to 185-thousand-733.

Of the new cases, one-thousand-574 were local transmissions and 56 were from overseas.

The daily figure fell to the 16-hundreds after hitting a new record of one-thousand-842 the previous day.

With no signs of a slowdown in infections, the government decided to extend the highest Level Four distancing measures in the greater Seoul area for two weeks. 

By region, the greater metro area accounted for 64-point-one percent of local infections, including 516 in Seoul and 403 in Gyeonggi Province. 

Other parts of the nation added 565 cases or 35-point-nine percent of local cases. This is a fresh record in the fourth wave of the epidemic, with the ratio remaining above 30 percent for the sixth straight day.  

Three more deaths have been reported, raising the total to two-thousand-66. The COVID-19 fatality rate for the nation stands at one-point-11 percent.  

The number of critically ill patients rose by nine to 227.