Starting noon tomorrow, all outbound travelers must have their temperature taken before boarding the plane to curb the spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), Premier Yu Shyi-kun announced yesterday.
"To minimize the risk of out-bound travelers being denied access to foreign countries and the possibility of catching SARS on the plane, those who are traveling abroad should have their temperature taken before checking their luggage in and leaving the country," Yu said.
Yu made the remark yesterday morning on Ali Mountain, Chiayi County where he presided over a regular meeting of the Cabinet's committee for the promotion of the tourism industry.
According to Yu, since the health department requested in-bound travelers have their temperature taken and fill out a SARS survey form at the entrance gate on March 29, over 82,000 passengers have had their temperature taken. Forty-one of them showed abnormally high temperature, 38 of the 41 were later sent to the hospital.
On April 18, a China-based Taiwanese businessman was fined NT$60,000 for refusing to have his temperature taken at the CKS International Airport upon arrival from China.
He is the first person to face a SARS-related penalty since the disease first appeared here early last month.
According to the Center for Disease Control (CDC), the nation has seen a cumulative total of 192 reported SARS cases nationwide as of yesterday afternoon. While 28 of them were probable cases, 46 were suspected ones.
A total of 1,901 people have been put under domestic quarantine and, of those, 1,574 people have been lifted from the list.
The WHO recommends that all SARS cases should be put under domestic quarantine for seven days after they are discharged from hospitals because the cases might still continue to spread the disease after their recovery.
The CDC asked all probable SARS cases discharged from hospitals to stay under home quarantine for 14 days.
Meanwhile, Taiwan might see its first SARS death after a 72-year-old man from Kinmen died from myocardial infection and pulmonary failure at Taipei's Veterans General Hospital on Friday.
The hospital will perform an autopsy to determine whether the man's death had anything to do with SARS.
The government has been boasting of its zero death, zero export and zero community infection since the outbreak of the deadly disease.
The man, surnamed Lee (李), was admitted to Kinmen County Hospital on Wednesday, complaining of a chest pains. He was later transferred to the Veterans General Hospital.
Lee, who reportedly had never been to China, had long been suffering from such chronic problems as tuberculosis and heart disease.
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Five flights have been arranged to help nearly 2,000 Taiwanese tourists return home from Okinawa after being stranded due to cruise ship maintenance issues, the Ministry of Transportation and Communications announced yesterday. China Airlines Ltd (中華航空), and EVA Airways Corp (長榮航空) have arranged five flights with a total of 748 additional seats to transport 1,857 passengers from the MSC Bellissima back to Taiwan, the ministry said. The flights have been scheduled for yesterday and today by the Civil Aviation Administration, with the cruise operator covering all associated costs. The MSC Bellissima, carrying 4,341 passengers, departed from Keelung on Wednesday last week for Okinawa,
China is deploying its largest navy fleet in regional waters in nearly three decades, posing a threat to Taiwan that is more pronounced than previous Chinese war games, the Ministry of National Defense said today. Speaking in Taipei, ministry spokesperson Sun Li-fang (孫立方) said the scale of the current Chinese naval deployment in an area running from the southern Japanese islands down into the South China Sea was the largest since China held war games around Taiwan ahead of 1996 Taiwanese presidential elections. China's military has yet to comment and has not confirmed it is carrying out any exercises. "The current scale is
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