Taiwan is in the first group of nations that are to receive COVID-19 vaccines via the WHO’s COVAX scheme, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said yesterday.
Centers for Disease Control Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥), the CECC’s spokesman, told reporters that Taiwan, which is listed as a “non-UN member state” for COVAX purposes, has been allocated AstraZeneca vaccines.
Non-UN member states are to receive 1.3 million AstraZeneca doses between them, Chung said, citing a COVAX report, which did not list the states given that classification.
Photo: Reuters
The WHO would separately inform states that are to receive doses after issuing emergency-use validation, he said, adding that the government would update the public on a delivery date when the information becomes available.
Chuang later told the Central News Agency that the WHO has not validated the AstraZeneca vaccine for emergency use and no delivery date would be affixed until validation is issued.
The WHO is expected to validate the vaccine next month, while delivery and distribution of the vaccines would take another week, he said.
Given these factors, the CECC believes delivery could begin any time from next month to June, he said.
Earlier, Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中) declined to give a specific timeline for vaccine distribution in Taiwan.
Distribution would depend on factors ranging from vaccine acquisition, distribution efficiency, the public’s willingness to be vaccinated and virus mutations, Chen told a news briefing in Taipei.
“The sooner the goods arrive and the more receptive people are to being vaccinated, the faster we can innoculate,” he said.
Taiwan would gradually reopen its borders after vaccination coverage reaches about 60 percent, the level required to establish “herd immunity,” Chen said.
Once the communities in Taiwan are secure, visitors would be allowed to enter after a negative polymerase chain reaction test and isolation periods that would progressively shorten — from 14 days to 10, seven and three, he said.
The reopening of the borders “will not happen in a single leap,” Chen said, adding that a phased reopening would be implemented, depending on the pandemic situation abroad, positive test rates and public compliance with mask-wearing and handwashing.
The CECC would not allow people who have been vaccinated to skip quarantine protocols, Chen said, adding: “In my view, vaccines are not the most crucial component in successful pandemic management.”
A member of the US Congress received a jab nine days before testing positive for COVID-19, which shows that there are unanswered questions about the protection vaccines provide and the possibility that people might be infectious even after being innoculated, he said.
Earlier yesterday, the Chinese-language Apple Daily cited Chen as saying in an exclusive interview that he expects vaccinations to begin by June, which is later than the rollout date of March that officials had estimated in December last year.
Chen told the Apple Daily that the nation has experienced difficulties in procuring vaccine doses.
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