Behind a closed metal gate and a sign barring entry to outsiders, dozens of religious sect members are quarantined in a social housing complex in Daegu, the epicenter of South Korea’s coronavirus outbreak.

Painted in faded pastel tones and reserved for young, poor women, the development has seen nearly a third of its 142 residents test positive for the virus.

Each patient is a member of the Shincheonji Church of Jesus, a secretive religious group linked to most of the South’s cases.

Shincheonji members make up around two-thirds of the total inhabitants, city authorities say, but for a time quarantine was imposed on everyone there, regardless of status or affiliation.

That made the concrete five-story buildings the only ones in the South to have been entirely restricted.

The coronavirus patients from the “Hanmaeum” complex have been moved to medical facilities but 30 people — all but three of them Shincheonji members — remain in isolation in their apartments.

“It has been weeks now with no clear end in sight, though I have tested negative for the virus,” said one. “I wake up in the morning and spend hours reading books and studying.”