The Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) yesterday reported 30 domestic COVID-19 cases, three imported cases and four deaths.
Of the local cases, 15 were men and 15 were women, with the onset of symptoms reported between Saturday and Wednesday, the center said.
Taipei and New Taipei City recorded 11 cases each, Taoyuan had seven cases and Hsinchu City had one, it said.
Photo: Yang Yuan-ting, Taipei Times
Twenty-four of the local cases had known sources of infection, five had unclear links with confirmed cases and one was under investigation, it said.
Despite the relatively high number of cases yesterday, the COVID-19 situation “is still under control,” Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who heads the center, said at the CECC’s daily news conference in Taipei.
The center reported 16 domestic cases on Wednesday, 18 on Tuesday, 15 each on Monday and Sunday, eight on Saturday and 29 on Friday last week.
The new imported cases include a Taiwanese boy under the age of 10 who returned from China on July 8, the center said.
He had no symptoms since his arrival, the center said, adding that one contact of the boy has been ordered to isolate.
Another imported case is an American man in his 20s who arrived from the US on Tuesday for work, the center said.
He had no symptoms since his arrival, and five passengers on his flight have been asked to isolate, it added.
The third imported case is a Taiwanese man in his 20s who returned from the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday, the center said.
On Wednesday, he developed a cough, dizziness and a slightly elevated body temperature, it said, adding that health authorities have arranged for his treatment and contact tracing is under way.
The deaths were two men and two women, aged 60 to 79, who were confirmed to have COVID-19 between June 4 and June 29, it said.
They died between Monday and Wednesday, the center said, adding that all four had chronic health conditions.
One of them — a woman in her 70s who died on Wednesday — was infected with the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 and is the nation’s first death from that variant, said Centers for Disease Control Deputy Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞), who is deputy head of the CECC’s medical response division.
The course of her infection had not been particularly different from that of patients with other variants, he said.
As of yesterday, Taiwan had recorded 15,511 confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 1,253 imported and 14,205 domestic cases, and 782 deaths, CECC data showed.
The center said that 14,255 cases were reported between May 11 and Tuesday, adding that 12,456 of them, or 87.4 percent, have recovered.
Meanwhile, the CECC said that community-based dementia care centers would be allowed to resume services as long as they follow guidelines for COVID-19 prevention and management set by the Ministry of Health and Welfare.
Care center staff, patients and those accompanying them must have either received their first dose of COVID-19 vaccine at least 14 days prior to entering the facility, or provide a negative test report from within three days of entering, the CECC said.
The guidelines also include measures that facilities should take under different COVID-19 alert levels, as well as how they should respond in the event of a suspected or confirmed COVID-19 case at the facility.
Separately yesterday, Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Joanne Ou (歐江安) said that the ministry and the Taipei Economic and Trade Office in Indonesia are in talks with several airlines about the possibility of arranging a charter flight to return Taiwanese from the country hit hard by a wave of COVID-19 infections.
Ou’s remarks came after a report that a Batik Air charter flight arranged by an Indonesia-based Taiwanese business association for Wednesday next week was canceled due to scheduling issues.
About 120 people had registered for the flight, including 21 based in severely affected East Java Province, the report said.
Additional reporting by Lu Yi-hsuan
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