Taiwan to be on heightened alert until at least Feb. 4

Описание к видео Taiwan to be on heightened alert until at least Feb. 4

Northern Taiwan is in a state of heightened alert following the recent cluster infection at Taoyuan General Hospital. Officials have tested hundreds of people and are watching closely for wider community spread. They say they''ll need to wait and see for two more weeks before determining the trajectory of the virus. If the case count stays flat all the way to Feb. 4, then Taoyuan may be out of the woods. If it doesn''t, then officials may start looking into tougher control measures.

The COVID virus is mutating, becoming more transmissible. In the latest wave of infections that hit a Taoyuan hospital, the culprit was the D614G variant, which carried the mutation L452R.

Speaking to the press about the Taoyuan hospital cluster, health minister Chen Shih-chung said it was crucial that the public not let its guard down before Feb. 4.
But according to National Taiwan University Hospital physician Huang Li-min 黃立民, it’s better to stay vigilant for longer than that.

Huang Li-min
Physician
Assuming this is really the first wave, even if people get infected, it may not show up right away. Normally you must wait until there is another wave of infections, and older people get infected. They develop pneumonia and end up in the hospital where it is detected. Even after the incubation period is over, can we guarantee that everything is fine? This situation requires further observation. We need to observe it until after the Lunar New Year. After the Taiwanese businesspeople leave, if things are still fine – then we can consider ourselves to be safer.

According to the CECC, Taiwan is still at Stage 1 of COVID contagion. This is described as sporadic incidents of community spread, caused by imported cases. The second stage involves the emergence of local cases with an unknown source of infection. The third stage is three or more cluster infections in a single week. Once Taiwan reaches that stage, there will be a ban on indoors gatherings of five or more people, and outdoor gatherings of more than 10. There will be movement restrictions at the sites of the cluster infections. In the fourth stage, the highest level of contagion, there will be a rapid increase of local cases, averaging more than 100 cases each day for a 14-day period. At that point, officials will start considering a lockdown.

Huang Li-min
Physician
The day before you feel sick, you are already emitting the virus. So actually on that day, you feel totally fine, and you have no idea you’ll be sick the next day, but you are infecting the people you come in contact with. The U.S. has already reported this. In research done nationwide there, half the people studied were infected by others who displayed no symptoms. This is the reason it is so hard to prevent the virus’s spread.

As the number of asymptomatic cases rises and virus mutations increase transmissibility, disease prevention authorities are scrambling to keep up.

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