Taiwan warned the WHO and China about possible human-to-human transmission of the new coronavirus at the end of last year, but the global health body did not make it public, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday.
Department of International Organizations Director-General Bob Chen (陳龍錦) made the remark at a news briefing in Taipei, when asked about statements made by US Department of State spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus.
“Dec. 31— that’s the same day Taiwan first tried to warn WHO of human-human transmission. Chinese authorities meanwhile silenced doctors and refused to admit human-human transmission until Jan. 20, with catastrophic consequences,” Ortagus wrote on Twitter yesterday.
Photo: Lu Yi-hsuan, Taipei Times
Her tweet was in response to a post by Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Hua Chunying (華春瑩), who wrote that the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission had issued a notice about the virus on Dec. 31 last year.
The commission’s notice reported 27 cases, including seven severe ones, in Wuhan, but said that no obvious transmission among people had been observed.
The Centers for Disease Control on Dec. 31 last year did ask China and the WHO’s International Health Regulations contact for information about the abnormal outbreak of pneumonia in Wuhan, while the ministry’s representative office in Geneva, Switzerland, also contacted the WHO secretariat, Chen said.
On the same day, the centers started implementing onboard inspections on direct flights from Wuhan landing in Taiwan, he said.
The WHO later replied that it received the message and would transfer it to other experts, but did not make it public, he said.
There are e-mail records of the communication between the centers and the WHO, he added.
Taiwan’s disease prevention strategy was predicated on the concept that the virus could be transmitted among people, ministry spokeswoman Joanne Ou (歐江安) said.
The nation thanks the US and other like-minded nations for their support, and would work with the global community to contain the virus, she said.
Meanwhile, the WHO secretariat is still evaluating whether to convene the 73rd session of the World Health Assembly from May 17 to 21, turn it into a virtual meeting or postpone it until autumn, Chen said.
Although it is almost impossible for WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus to invite Taiwan to join the assembly as an observer, the ministry would continue to push for Taiwan’s participation in the meeting, he said.
In other developments, British Secretary of Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Dominic Raab has advised all Britons who are usually based in the UK to return home soon, given the rapidly changing situation regarding travel restrictions and flights, the British Office Taipei said in a statement.
The advice does not apply to Britons who are residents in Taiwan.
South Korea has adjusted its electronic arrival card system to no longer list Taiwan as a part of China, a move that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said would help facilitate exchanges between the two sides. South Korea previously listed “Taiwan” as “Taiwan (China)” in the drop-down menus of its online arrival card system, where people had to fill out where they came from and their next destination. The ministry had requested South Korea make a revision and said it would change South Korea’s name on Taiwan’s online immigration system from “Republic of Korea” to “Korea (South),” should the issue not be
Tainan, Taipei and New Taipei City recorded the highest fines nationwide for illegal accommodations in the first quarter of this year, with fines issued in the three cities each exceeding NT$7 million (US$220,639), Tourism Administration data showed. Among them, Taipei had the highest number of illegal short-term rental units, with 410. There were 3,280 legally registered hotels nationwide in the first quarter, down by 14 properties, or 0.43 percent, from a year earlier, likely indicating operators exiting the market, the agency said. However, the number of unregistered properties rose to 1,174, including 314 illegal hotels and 860 illegal short-term rental
Both sides of the Taiwan Strait share a political foundation based on the “1992 consensus” and opposition to Taiwanese independence, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) today said during her meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平). Both sides of the Strait should plan and build institutionalized and sustainable mechanisms for dialogue and cooperation based on that foundation to make peaceful development across the Strait irreversible, she said. Peace is a shared moral value across the Strait, and both sides should move beyond political confrontation to seek institutionalized solutions to prevent war, she said. Mutually beneficial cross-strait relations are what the
ECONOMIC COERCION: Such actions are often inconsistently applied, sometimes resumed, and sometimes just halted, the Presidential Office spokeswoman said The government backs healthy and orderly cross-strait exchanges, but such arrangements should not be made with political conditions attached and never be used as leverage for political maneuvering or partisan agendas, Presidential Office spokeswoman Karen Kuo (郭雅慧) said yesterday. Kuo made the remarks after China earlier in the day announced 10 new “incentive measures” for Taiwan, following a landmark meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) in Beijing on Friday. The measures, unveiled by China’s Xinhua news agency, include plans to resume individual travel by residents of Shanghai and China’s Fujian
RSS