South Korea’s National Assembly passed a revised Occupational Safety and Health Act on Oct. 1, allowing fines of up to 5% of operating profits when three or more workers die in industrial accidents within a year following safety-regulation violations. The measure passed 161-52, with six abstentions, despite opposition from the People Power Party, which said the penalty could impose excessive burdens on companies. The Democratic Party of Korea said the cap, calculated from operating profit rather than sales, counters claims that fines could reach hundreds of billions or trillions of won. The legislation also provides grounds to seek business-registration cancellations for frequent major accidents and requires operations to halt after corrective orders from the Minister of Employment and Labor. The Assembly separately revised the Emergency Medical Service Act to allow medical authorities to designate a hospital for critically ill patients when paramedics cannot find one willing to admit them. Hospitals declining patients must provide legitimate reasons.