Shipments of Moderna COVID-19 vaccines are due to arrive in Taiwan next month, while another batch of AstraZeneca vaccines allotted to Taiwan under the COVAX program is due to arrive by June, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said yesterday.
The Chinese-language Apple Daily reported that the Moderna vaccines might arrive at the end of this month or next month.
The center in February said that Moderna had agreed to supply about 5 million doses to Taiwan, although at the time the center estimated that they would arrive in the middle of this year.
Photo: Reuters
Centers for Disease Control Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥), who is the CECC’s spokesman, said that 9,470 additional AstraZeneca shots had been sent to 68 medical facilities to expedite the rollout.
The CECC would also provide shots to local health departments, Chuang said, amid reports that vaccinations are lagging due to wariness among the public.
The Apple Daily quoted National Taiwan University Children’s Hospital pediatrician Huang Li-min (黃立民) as saying that low administration rates of the AstraZeneca vaccine was due to safety doubts, not people failing to heed CECC recommendations to get the jab.
The AstraZeneca vaccine has been linked to unusual blood clots, resulting in reluctance to get the shots, Huang said, adding that the Moderna vaccines should not draw the same skepticism.
The CECC is moving forward with the vaccine rollout, Chuang said.
The Food and Drug Administration has been asked to contact the manufacturers of the vaccines and inquire about extending their shelf life.
Two shipments of AstraZeneca vaccines expire on May 31 and June 15.
Regulations say that the manufacturer must conduct a stability test before an application to extend a shelf life can be submitted, Chuang said.
In the worst case, the expiration date would be unalterable and the vaccines disposed of, he said.
Asked about Denmark’s decision to stop its rollout of AstraZeneca vaccines completely, Chuang said that nations have their own considerations and standards, citing decisions in the US and Australia to halt inoculations with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, while France is pushing forward with that product.
Including 1,319 people given the the AstraZeneca vaccine on Wednesday, Taiwan has inoculated 28,465 people, Chuang said.
Twelve cases of an adverse event following immunization were reported on Wednesday, but the cases were not severe, he said.
The CECC yesterday announced one additional confirmed case of imported COVID-19, designated case No. 1,069.
A Taiwanese aged under five who had been living in Indonesia arrived in Taiwan on March 28 with case No. 1,036, the CECC said.
EUROPEAN TARGETS: The planned Munich center would support TSMC’s European customers to design high-performance, energy-efficient chips, an executive said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday said that it plans to launch a new research-and-development (R&D) center in Munich, Germany, next quarter to assist customers with chip design. TSMC Europe president Paul de Bot made the announcement during a technology symposium in Amsterdam on Tuesday, the chipmaker said. The new Munich center would be the firm’s first chip designing center in Europe, it said. The chipmaker has set up a major R&D center at its base of operations in Hsinchu and plans to create a new one in the US to provide services for major US customers,
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday said that it would redesign the written portion of the driver’s license exam to make it more rigorous. “We hope that the exam can assess drivers’ understanding of traffic rules, particularly those who take the driver’s license test for the first time. In the past, drivers only needed to cram a book of test questions to pass the written exam,” Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) told a news conference at the Taoyuan Motor Vehicle Office. “In the future, they would not be able to pass the test unless they study traffic regulations
GAINING STEAM: The scheme initially failed to gather much attention, with only 188 cards issued in its first year, but gained popularity amid the COVID-19 pandemic Applications for the Employment Gold Card have increased in the past few years, with the card having been issued to a total of 13,191 people from 101 countries since its introduction in 2018, the National Development Council (NDC) said yesterday. Those who have received the card have included celebrities, such as former NBA star Dwight Howard and Australian-South Korean cheerleader Dahye Lee, the NDC said. The four-in-one Employment Gold Card combines a work permit, resident visa, Alien Resident Certificate (ARC) and re-entry permit. It was first introduced in February 2018 through the Act Governing Recruitment and Employment of Foreign Professionals (外國專業人才延攬及雇用法),
‘A SURVIVAL QUESTION’: US officials have been urging the opposition KMT and TPP not to block defense spending, especially the special defense budget, an official said The US plans to ramp up weapons sales to Taiwan to a level exceeding US President Donald Trump’s first term as part of an effort to deter China as it intensifies military pressure on the nation, two US officials said on condition of anonymity. If US arms sales do accelerate, it could ease worries about the extent of Trump’s commitment to Taiwan. It would also add new friction to the tense US-China relationship. The officials said they expect US approvals for weapons sales to Taiwan over the next four years to surpass those in Trump’s first term, with one of them saying