'비말 차단용' 마스크, 오늘부터 5백원에 공급

In time for the summer season, the highly-anticipated sale of super-thin, droplet-blocking face masks started today.
Millions of people flooded onto one particular company's website to make their purchases but the level of demand caused the website to crash.
Our Kim Do-yeon has more.
Due to high demand, a South Korean website selling super-thin masks has crashed on its first day of sales.
Local mask producer, 'Welkeeps', released its new product on Friday morning and by 11AM, a total of seven-point-eight million people had visited the website.
The droplet-blocking masks are priced at around 40 U.S. cents each and, with two fewer layers, are a third of weight of the KF-94 type.
This makes breathing easier while also helping to ease the summer time heat but the level of protection is known to be 50 to 80 percent lower than KF-94s.
With demand high, the company said they will try to accommodate consumers to the best of their abilities.
"We plan to manufacture 100 to 200 thousand daily while analyzing the response from consumers and diversifying retail routes."
The company set a limit of 30 masks per person per day to prevent stockpiling.
The hoarding of masks was a problem throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, as people inflated prices when reselling them.
Recently, as the weather became hotter, prices quadrupled for thinner types of mask. In response, the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety approved nine thinner types of masks for sale from four different companies.
Unlike the previous mask distribution policy, this new type will be sold by the companies themselves, so release dates and purchase limitations are different for each seller.
Meanwhile, other companies are yet to confirm the official release dates of their new droplet-blocking masks.
Kim Do-yeon, Arirang News