In a blow to the country's hopes that the SARS epidemic had been brought under control, Taipei City Government said yesterday that two people at Taipei Municipal Yang Ming Hospital (
According to the Taipei City Bureau of Health, two care workers surnamed Chen and Huang began showing a fever on Sunday and anomalies were found in their chest X-rays on Wednesday. Tests yesterday revealed that they both had contracted the coronavirus, the virus that causes SARS.
"The two care workers were from Taipei Municipal Hao Jen Pensioners' Home (
The two care workers were apparently working at Yang Ming Hospital when they fell ill.
Two of Huang's patients, another patient in the same ward and another care worker have a fever and will be transferred to hospitals equipped to deal with SARS patients, according to Chang Heng (
"In response to the in-hospital SARS outbreak, Yang Ming has quickly shut down its emergency department and set up a SARS command center headed by its superintendent, Wang Tai-lung (王泰隆). Normal treatment services and fever examination stations remain in operation," Chang said.
Chang said the operation to seal off areas where the suspected SARS patients had been was completed by 6pm yesterday.
Anyone who might have had contact with the new cases was being summoned back to the hospital, including at least 54 employees who will be quarantined.
Eighteen patients at the hospital who might have had contact with the care workers or fever patients were being closely monitored, Chang said.
Also see story:
A subsidiary of a Hong Kong-based company that has lost control of two critical ports on the Panama Canal said it is seeking US$2 billion of compensation in damages from Panama over its “illegal” takeover of the ports. Panama Ports Co, a unit of Hong Kong’s CK Hutchison Holdings (長江和記實業), on Friday said in a statement that it is demanding the sum under international arbitration proceedings that it had already started. The Panamanian government last week seized control of the Balboa and Cristobal ports on each end of the Panama Canal, after the country’s Supreme Court declared earlier that a concession allowing
DETERRENCE: With 1,000 indigenous Hsiung Feng II and III missiles and 400 Harpoon missiles, the nation would boast the highest anti-ship missile density in the world With Taiwan wrapping up mass production of Hsiung Feng II and III missiles by December and an influx of Harpoon missiles from the US, Taiwan would have the highest density of anti-ship missiles in the world, a source said yesterday. Taiwan is to wrap up mass production of the indigenous anti-ship missiles by the end of year, as the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology has been meeting production targets ahead of schedule, a defense official with knowledge of the matter said. Combined with the 400 Harpoon anti-ship missiles Taiwan expects to receive from the US by 2028, the nation would have
POSSIBILITIES EMERGE: With Taiwan’s victory and Japan’s narrow win over Australia, Taiwan now have a chance to advance if South Korea also beat the Aussies Taiwan has high hopes that the national baseball team would advance to the World Baseball Classic (WBC) quarter-finals after clinching a crucial 5-4 victory over South Korea in a nail-biting extra-inning game at the Tokyo Dome yesterday. Boosted by three home runs — two solo shots by Yu Chang (張育成) and Cheng Tsung-che (鄭宗哲) and a two-run homer by Stuart Fairchild — the triumph gave Taiwan a much-needed second victory in the five-team Pool C, where only the top two finishers would advance to the knockout stage in Miami, Florida. Entering extra innings with the game tied at four apiece, Taiwan scored
MISSION OF PEACE: The foreign minister urged Beijing to respect Taiwan’s existence as an independent nation, and work together to ensure peace and stability in the region Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) yesterday rejected Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi’s (王毅) comments about Taiwan, criticizing China as a “troublemaker” in the international community and a disruptor of cross-strait peace. Speaking at a news conference on the sidelines of the Chinese National People’s Congress, Wang said that Taiwan has always been a territory of China and that it would be impossible for it to become its own country. The “return” of Taiwan to China was the natural outcome of the Chinese people’s resistance against Japan in World War II, and that any pursuit of independence was “doomed