Wed, Apr 15, 2020 page3

• Virus Outbreak: Reporter’s Notebook: Two men at the center of the fight

  • By Wu Liang-yi, Lin Hui-chin and William Hetherington / Staff reporters, with staff writer
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  Before mid-January, Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中) was a name that few Taiwanese were familiar with.

  When Chen appeared before cameras that month, many asked: “Who is that?”

  However, after a charter flight evacuating 247 Taiwanese from Wuhan, China, arrived in Taiwan at 11:50pm on Feb. 3 and Chen appeared on TV choking back tears as he briefed the public that one of the evacuees had contracted COVID-19, people nationwide suddenly began talking about him.

  Since then there have been two additional charter flights to evacuate Taiwanese from Wuhan, the Diamond Princess and SuperStar Aquarius cruise ships were quarantined with Taiwanese on board and scores of Taiwanese have returned from hard-hit Europe and the US.

  Throughout all of it, Chen was on duty, taking no rest from his role as head of the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC).

  Some people might ask, as there are other officials who could fill in for him on occasion, why does Chen insist on remaining involved in the CECC’s daily affairs?

  The answer might have something to do with Chen’s personality, as well as his ability to understand minute details and recognize oversights.

  Chen understands that a small slipup during a crisis can undermine authorities’ long-term efforts.

  Some people have complained that their freedoms have been restricted by disease prevention efforts, but Chen has held firm in his stance that sacrificing some conveniences and freedoms is a necessary trade-off to effectively keep the epidemic under control in Taiwan.

  “The virus is our enemy. It does not discriminate between people and it would infect all of us,” Chen has said.

  Strict measures have meant that life has mostly gone on as usual in Taiwan, with even the nation’s professional baseball and basketball competitions being held as usual. In comparison, all professional sports competitions in the US and Europe have been canceled.

  While Chen has been widely praised for his dedication, even he has not been spared criticism.

  For example, Chen has long been a smoker, causing embarrassment for the Ministry of Health and Welfare, which has aggressively promoted campaigns urging people to quit smoking and uses taxes from tobacco products to fund the Long-term Care Services Program 2.0.

  As smokers are a high-risk group for the novel coronavirus — because COVID-19 attacks the respiratory system — many people have called on Chen to quit smoking.

  Meanwhile, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥), who is also the CECC’s spokesman, has also played a critical role throughout the pandemic by balancing the privacy of patients with the public’s need to know important information.

  An epidemiologist who specializes in infectious diseases, Chuang has joked that his cellphone rings nonstop these days with calls from the media.

  “I get 50 to 60 calls a day. It can be frustrating, but I do my best to keep my cool,” he said.

  Chuang said that he has not taken a single day of rest since the government on Dec. 31 last year instituted a ban on flights from Wuhan.

  Worried that he will be too tired to drive home safely, Chuang’s wife picks him up daily from the CDC’s offices.

  Chuang said that he has gained weight over the past three months, because he has not been keeping up his regular exercise routine of playing table tennis in the evening and hiking on weekends.

  However, now is not the time for the nation to let its guard down, as doing so could result in a huge outbreak, he said.

  The most important task of the CDC and the CECC is now to avoid a follow-up wave of infections, Chuang said, adding that the development of a vaccine or medicine that effectively fights the disease would be the best-case scenario.
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