The presidential office said Wednesday that it would focus first on combating the Middle East respiratory syndrome, brushing aside the mounting calls from political circles to apologize over the government’s poor initial handling of the disease.

“For now, we have to prioritize coping with the MERS outbreak and bringing an end to it,” said a senior presidential official.

Admitting that the government’s early response to the outbreak was “insufficient,” the official said Cheong Wa Dae is not trying to evade its responsibility over the crisis, but concentrating on the ongoing mission to fight against the virus that had killed 27 and infected 179 as of Wednesday.

The remark came amid mounting demands from both rival parties for the president to deliver a public apology over the government’s slow initial response.

The government has been under fire for concealing information of MERS-infected patients and the hospitals where they were admitted and treated. The health ministry had rejected calls to disclose names of MERS-hit hospitals, stressing that it would paralyze the nation’s medical sector.

They had expressed concerns that hospitals could refuse to treat patients suspected of MERS and also suffer huge losses of income if other patients stopped visiting those clinics. More than 90 percent of South Korea’s hospital beds are at for-profit institutions, which the government does not hold absolute control over.

Authorities later revealed the names and routes patients traveled. But its belated revelation sparked the public’s anger, with many blasting the government, saying that its slow move aggravated the spread of the disease.

A ruling party lawmaker told Yonhap News agency that the president may deliver an apology later over the government’s bungled response, after the disease has come under control.

Observers also said that Cheong Wa Dae may mull offering an apology at an appropriate time as it fears the opposition party throwing the issue into a political contest.

Park was under massive pressure to apologize for the Sewol ferry crisis last year. Park delivered an official apology over the government’s poor response more than a month after the ferry sank off the nation’s southwestern coast and killed more than 300 passengers, mostly teenagers on a school trip to Jejudo Island.

By Cho Chung-un (christory@heraldcorp.com)