The Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) yesterday ordered the suspension of work at an electronics company where a cluster of 182 COVID-19 infections was reported. It also ordered all migrant workers at the firm to enter home isolation.
King Yuan Electronics, a chip testing and packaging service provider based in Hsinchu City that employs many migrant workers at its two factories in Miaoli County, last week conducted rapid COVID-19 tests on all of its more than 7,000 employees after several migrant workers tested positive.
The CECC yesterday said that 182 confirmed cases — including 24 Taiwanese and 158 foreigners — were reported at King Yuan Electronics, and 399 close contacts had as of Saturday been identified.
Two other electronics companies in Miaoli County each had 12 COVID-19 cases among their employees, the center said, adding that these cases are two Taiwanese and 22 foreigners.
Contact tracing is being conducted, it said.
Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who heads the center, said that the CECC ordered King Yuan Electronics to take five measures to rein in the spread of the disease.
Among the measures was that the firm’s “migrant workers are suspended from work and must practice home isolation, but they will continue to receive full pay,” Chen said.
Those who work in the firm’s high-risk areas would quarantine at centralized facilities, while those working in lower-risk areas were ordered to isolate in their dormitories, where they would practice self-health management, Chen said.
Contact tracing would focus on the Taiwanese who were confirmed to have the virus’ so that their close contacts could immediately be placed under home isolation, Chen said, adding that all employees who tested negative were ordered to practice enhanced self-health management.
All employees who tested positive isolate at hospitals, Chen said.
King Yuan Electronics would be allowed to resume partial operations under a site-specific COVID-19 prevention program once on-site inspections by the Industrial Development Bureau, Center for Disease Control physicians and the company management have cleared the facilities, Chen said.
Taiwanese were praised for their composure after a video filmed by Taiwanese tourists capturing the moment a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Japan’s Aomori Prefecture went viral on social media. The video shows a hotel room shaking violently amid Monday’s quake, with objects falling to the ground. Two Taiwanese began filming with their mobile phones, while two others held the sides of a TV to prevent it from falling. When the shaking stopped, the pair calmly took down the TV and laid it flat on a tatami mat, the video shows. The video also captured the group talking about the safety of their companions bathing
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
Starting on Jan. 1, YouBike riders must have insurance to use the service, and a six-month trial of NT$5 coupons under certain conditions would be implemented to balance bike shortages, a joint statement from transportation departments across Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan announced yesterday. The rental bike system operator said that coupons would be offered to riders to rent bikes from full stations, for riders who take out an electric-assisted bike from a full station, and for riders who return a bike to an empty station. All riders with YouBike accounts are automatically eligible for the program, and each membership account
A classified Pentagon-produced, multiyear assessment — the Overmatch brief — highlighted unreported Chinese capabilities to destroy US military assets and identified US supply chain choke points, painting a disturbing picture of waning US military might, a New York Times editorial published on Monday said. US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s comments in November last year that “we lose every time” in Pentagon-conducted war games pitting the US against China further highlighted the uncertainty about the US’ capability to intervene in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. “It shows the Pentagon’s overreliance on expensive, vulnerable weapons as adversaries field cheap, technologically
RSS