Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) yesterday called on the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration to allocate more funds toward vaccine development in its proposed second special budget for COVID-19, saying the nation might not be able to secure enough vaccines from foreign developers.
The Executive Yuan last week unveiled its proposed second special budget of NT$210 billion (US$7.12 billion) for COVID-19 prevention and economic revitalization, which includes NT$500 million earmarked as bonuses or rewards for vaccine developers, Chiang told a news conference in Taipei.
The KMT caucus had proposed such an incentive in its draft budget proposal in February, but the DPP caucus had rejected it, before adopting it in the Executive Yuan proposal, he said.
Had the DPP accepted the KMT’s proposal at the time, it would have accelerated the nation’s vaccine development efforts, which are lagging behind the UK, US and EU, he said.
The government should consider injecting more funds as incentives to pharmaceutical companies to bring the nation’s vaccine development up to speed, he said.
The second special budget proposal would allocate NT$13.5 billion to vaccine development, of which NT$11.5 billion would be used to procure vaccines manufactured by developers overseas, he said.
However, as Taiwan has not contributed financially to these foreign teams’ research and development (R&D) of vaccines and is not a member of any international R&D team, the government might not be able to secure the 15 million doses that it hopes to purchase, Chiang said.
Instead, the US, which is a major sponsor of several vaccine projects, the UK and less developed nations are likely to be the first to be able to purchase the vaccines, he said.
Local health authorities should also relax rules on vaccine testing if necessary, he said.
For example, the number of subjects required for a vaccine to pass a second-stage clinical trial used to be 3,000, but the Centers for Disease Control has streamlined that number to 1,000 after referring to standards adopted by the WHO and Japan, he said.
Only when vaccines are introduced can nations lift border restrictions and their economy be revitalized, he said.
Living With Hope Organization chairman Arthur Chen (陳宜民) said the US has Operation Warp Speed, a public-private partnership dedicated to the development of COVID-19 vaccines, but Taiwan’s pharmaceutical companies do not have a unifying body to oversee such efforts.
There is also a lack of government agencies to push efforts to initiate collaborations between local pharmaceutical firms and foreign research teams, he said.
The Ministry of Health and Welfare should clarify whether local firms that seek to partner with foreign teams are also eligible for the bonuses, he said.
The manufacture of the remaining 28 M1A2T Abrams tanks Taiwan purchased from the US has recently been completed, and they are expected to be delivered within the next one to two months, a source said yesterday. The Ministry of National Defense is arranging cargo ships to transport the tanks to Taiwan as soon as possible, said the source, who is familiar with the matter. The estimated arrival time ranges from late this month to early next month, the source said. The 28 Abrams tanks make up the third and final batch of a total of 108 tanks, valued at about NT$40.5 billion
Travel agencies in Taiwan are working to secure alternative flights for travelers bound for New Zealand for the Lunar New Year holiday, as Air New Zealand workers are set to strike next week. The airline said that it has confirmed that the planned industrial action by its international wide-body cabin crew would go ahead on Thursday and Friday next week. While the Auckland-based carrier pledged to take reasonable measures to mitigate the impact of the workers’ strike, an Air New Zealand flight arriving at Taipei from Auckland on Thursday and another flight departing from Taipei for Auckland on Saturday would have to
A group from the Taiwanese Designers in Australia association yesterday represented Taiwan at the Midsumma Pride March in Melbourne. The march, held in the St. Kilda suburb, is the city’s largest LGBTQIA+ parade and the flagship event of the annual Midsumma Festival. It attracted more than 45,000 spectators who supported the 400 groups and 10,000 marchers that participated this year, the association said. Taiwanese Designers said they organized a team to march for Taiwan this year, joining politicians, government agencies, professionals and community organizations in showing support for LGBTQIA+ people and diverse communities. As the first country in Asia to legalize same-sex
MOTIVES QUESTIONED The PLA considers Xi’s policies toward Taiwan to be driven by personal considerations rather than military assessment, the Epoch Times reports Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) latest purge of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) leadership might have been prompted by the military’s opposition to plans of invading Taiwan, the Epoch Times said. The Chinese military opposes waging war against Taiwan by a large consensus, putting it at odds with Xi’s vision, the Falun Gong-affiliated daily said in a report on Thursday, citing anonymous sources with insight into the PLA’s inner workings. The opposition is not the opinion of a few generals, but a widely shared view among the PLA cadre, the Epoch Times cited them as saying. “Chinese forces know full well that
RSS