I was reading this article at NHK, and in it there is a sentence that reads:
感染者の中には、今月２日ではなく別の日にこのナイトクラブを訪れた人がいたほか、ソウル以外の地方から訪れた人もいたということです。
Which I think I understand the main point of to mean:
[The report said] Of the infected people, there are people who visited that night club on a different day from the 2nd, and people who visited from a region outside of Seoul.
I am however, not sure how to interpret the ほか part of this sentence. I usually see it as a の adjective used to describe "other" as in 他の人. But here it seems to serve a more grammatical/particle-like purpose.
What is the usage of this word here? I am also wondering if this is more frequent in newspaper writing vs. less formal conversations.
