Taiwan is to launch a NT$24 billion (US$757.5 million) pharmaceutical resilience plan to improve the nation’s self-sufficiency in key medicines, President William Lai (賴清德) told a meeting of the Healthy Taiwan Promotion Committee at the Presidential Office in Taipei yesterday.
The policy is a response to shifts in geopolitics and the global economy, climate change and the threat posed by pandemics, Lai said.
Securing supply chains for essential medicines as a matter of national security and economic well-being would be carried out under the Cabinet’s direction, he said, adding that securing supplies is part of Taiwan’s whole-of-society resilience plan.
Photo: Chen Chien-chih, Taipei Times
It would tackle the risks associated with dependency on single or concentrated suppliers, including suppliers based in hostile foreign powers, he said.
The government would push for domestic capability to manufacture 50 types of medicines, including ingredients used in their production and biologics, Lai said.
That would be achieved via a mixture of subsidies, incentives funded by the National Health Insurance scheme and guidance for the private sector, he said.
The goal is to make certain that Taiwan would be able to supply itself with key medicines in a national emergency or crisis, he said.
A center would be created to monitor drug supplies with smart technology to forewarn the government of possible shortages and advise it on measures to streamline medicine supply chains, he said.
The initiative would spur technology upgrades and growth in Taiwan’s pharmaceutical industry, increasing its value to NT$1 trillion, Lai said.
Medicine is a crucial component of Taiwan’s societal resilience, economic future and place in global supply chains, he said.
The US, the EU and Japan are in the process of implementing similar measures to ensure stable supply of key medicines, he said.
Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Lin Ching-yi (林靜儀) said that there are plans to bring a second national controlled drugs manufacturing facility online next year.
Launching a second factory for producing controlled substances is necessary to carry out the administration’s medical resilience plan, Lin said.
The ministry would also create a committee to steer the nation’s 31 producers of active ingredient and 143 medicine makers to use domestic ingredients, she said.
China and India produce 80 percent of the active ingredients in the world’s medicine supply, a system whose vulnerability was underscored by the COVID-19 pandemic, Lin said.
A signaling system malfunction disrupted high-speed rail (HSR) services beginning at 8am today, with trains temporarily reduced to three northbound and three southbound trains per hour as authorities conduct inspections. The malfunction occurred on a section of track in Miaoli County during pre-operation checks early this morning, forcing northbound and southbound trains to use a single track, the HSR operator said. The regular schedule has been replaced with three hourly trains offering only nonreserved seating in each direction, stopping at every station, it said, adding that business class cars would still have reserved seating. Departures from terminal stations are scheduled at the top
Taiwan is still in the process of assessing the possibility of recruiting workers from Eswatini, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday, adding that its goal is to help Eswatini upgrade its vocational training centers. If there are plans to recruit workers from Eswatini, safeguarding national security, protecting public health and ensuring the employment rights of Taiwanese would be prerequisites, Department of West Asian and African Affairs Director-General Yen Chia-liang (顏嘉良) told a news conference. Key considerations would also include filling labor shortages in specific industries, and fostering bilateral professional and technical exchanges, he said. Yen was asked about the progress of labor
VERBOSE VESSELS: A CGA cutter and a China Coast Guard exchanged verbal barbs for more than a day in Taiwanese-controlled waters before the Chinese vessel left The Taiwanese and Chinese coast guards had a standoff near the strategically located Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the north of the South China Sea, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said yesterday. The two sides engaged in intense radio exchanges over sovereignty claims during the 33-hour standoff. China Coast Guard vessel 3501 eventually left the restricted waters, 26.6 nautical miles (49.2km) west of the Pratas Islands, at 5pm yesterday, the CGA said. Lying approximately between southern Taiwan and Hong Kong, the Taiwan-controlled Pratas are seen by some security experts as vulnerable to Chinese attack due to their distance — more than
A US uncrewed surface vessel (USV) encountered multiple Chinese warships during an autonomous transit of the Taiwan Strait, US defense company Seasats said in a statement on Wednesday. Seasats announced that a Lightfish USV had completed the first autonomous transit of the Taiwan Strait. Over five days, the USV traversed the entire length of the Strait while constantly monitoring surface vessel traffic, the company said. The Lightfish encountered multiple Chinese warships, one of which was a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) Type 056 corvette, it said. The Chinese vessels were operating “well within Taiwan’s exclusive economic zone without transmitting their identity via the
RSS