The domestic mask mandate for COVID-19 prevention would not be lifted in the next few weeks, but it might be eased in November at the earliest, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said yesterday, as it reported 46,608 new local cases.
The Chinese-language Mirror Media yesterday published an interview with Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Victor Wang (王必勝), who heads the CECC, in which it reported that the mask mandate might be eased in November if daily local caseloads are consistently low.
At a CECC news conference, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Deputy Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞), deputy head of the CECC’s medical response division, said that as the local outbreak of the Omicron BA.5 subvariant of SARS-CoV-2 is still at a peak, the mask regulations would not be revised much in the next few weeks to help prevent overwhelming Taiwan’s healthcare capacity.
Photo: CNA
The CECC regularly reviews COVID-19 restrictions, referencing the policies in other countries and discussing how restrictions can be gradually lifted, including easing mask rules in outdoor and indoor settings.
As to whether the mandate might be eased in November, Lo said it is not certain at this point.
However, the CECC would pay close attention to the local COVID-19 situation after quarantine requirements for people arriving in Taiwan are scrapped from next month.
CDC Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥), the CECC’s spokesman, said that 45,608 new local cases, 242 imported cases and 28 deaths were confirmed yesterday.
The daily caseload in the nation increased by 2.5 percent from Tuesday last week, he said, adding that BA.5 cases are still at a plateau.
New Taipei City reported the highest number of cases, with 9,019, followed by Taichung (with 6,154), Taipei (5,125), Taoyuan (4,220), Kaohsiung (4,186), Tainan (3,033), Changhua County (2,418), and fewer than 1,300 cases in the 15 other administrative regions.
Meanwhile, Lo said that after the CECC last week announced plans to lift border control measures, some frontline healthcare workers have asked if they would be allowed to travel abroad.
The temporary ban on overseas travel for healthcare workers was lifted on July 1, 2020, and the rule has not been in place since then, he said.
Healthcare workers have not traveled abroad much because of high demand at health facilities during the pandemic and because of the quarantine requirements on their return, he added.
After the “0+7” rule — no days of quarantine and seven days of “self-disease prevention” — is implemented, possibly on Oct. 13, healthcare workers would be allowed to go to work if they test negative seven days after returning to Taiwan, he said.
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