Seoul, Jan 26: At least 31 people were killed in ablaze at a hospital in South Korea today, Yonhap news agency said, with dozens more injured.

Video footage and pictures showed a helicopter flyingabove the building in Miryang, engulfed by heavy grey smokeand surrounded by multiple fire trucks.

The five-storey structure housed a nursing home as well as the hospital, and the South's Yonhap news agency said 31 people had been killed, citing firefighters at the site.

Earlier the national fire agency put the toll at 19.

"Two nurses said they had seen fire suddenly erupting inthe emergency room," said fire chief Choi Man-Woo, but thecause of the blaze was not immediately known.

All the patients had been evacuated, he added.

"The victims came both from the hospital and the nursinghome. Some died on their way to another hospital."

Pictures showed survivors being brought out wrapped inblankets, and firefighters picking their way through theblackened shell of the building after the blaze wasextinguished.

Around 200 people were in the Sejong Hospital buildingwhen the fire broke out, police said.

The fire came only a month after 29 people were killed in an inferno at a fitness club in the South Korean city of Jecheon -- a disaster blamed on insufficient emergency exits,flammable finishing materials and illegally parked cars blocking access to emergency vehicles.