Just short of a month since going online, a COVID-19 relief fundraiser organized by seven members of the Taiwanese diaspora raised more than US$50,000 for five social welfare groups helping society’s most vulnerable to weather the COVID-19 outbreak.
When COVID-19 cases began to spike in Taiwan in May, those of the group living in Taiwan began researching organizations with strong histories of helping vulnerable groups, including low-income individuals, domestic violence victims, migrant workers, homeless people and those with disabilities, the organizers said.
Their original plan to directly connect donors with the organizations proved challenging due to the organizations’ Chinese-only Web sites and inability to receive donations from abroad, so the organizers helped the groups create English landing pages and set up payment systems that can accept foreign transactions, they added.
After approaching about 15 organizations, the group ended up working with five: the 1919 Food Bank, the Hsinchulun Home, Homeless Taiwan, Serve the People and the Garden of Hope, they said.
The Taiwan Covid Relief Fundraiser eventually launched on July 8 with a goal of raising US$10,000, to be matched by the organizers.
The goal was reached after only three days, leading the team to revise its goal to US$25,000 with another matching donation.
By July 30, the fundraiser shattered the goal once more with US$26,000 raised by more than 200 donors for a total of more than US$50,000.
As of yesterday, the tally on the Taiwan Covid Relief Fundraiser Web site was US$28,191.
Most social welfare groups in Taiwan miss out on the chance to make themselves known internationally by only accepting domestic donations, Chinese Christian Relief Association secretary-general James Shia (夏忠堅) said yesterday, adding that he was particularly excited when the Taiwan Covid Relief team reached out to work with the association’s 1919 Food Bank.
The food bank has received US$10,000 through Taiwan Covid Relief, enough to satisfy the needs of 46 families for a year, Shia said.
The campaign has broken open international fundraising opportunities, he added.
Many people around the world want to give back to Taiwan in return for the assistance it provided last year, Taiwan Covid Relief organizer Catherine Chou (周怡齡) said.
UNDER WATCH: Taiwan will have to establish a standardized nucleic acid testing method to identify the virus and monitor its spread, the CDC said The Langya henipavirus, which can be transmitted from animals to humans, has been discovered in China, with 35 human infections reported so far, Taiwan’s Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said, adding that the nation would establish a nucleic acid testing method to identify the virus. A study titled “A Zoonotic Henipavirus in Febrile Patients in China” that was published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Thursday said that a new henipavirus associated with a fever-causing human illness was identified in China. The study said an investigation identified 35 patients with acute infection of the Langya henipavirus in China’s Shandong
BILINGUAL PLAN: The 17 educators were recruited under a program that seeks to empower Taiwanese, the envoy to the Philippines said The Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in the Philippines on Thursday hosted a send-off event for the first group of English-language teachers from the country who were recruited for a Ministry of Education-initiated program to advance bilingual education in Taiwan. The 14 teachers and three teaching assistants are part of the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which aims to help find English-language instructors for Taiwan’s public elementary and junior-high schools, the office said. Seventy-seven teachers and 11 teaching assistants from the Philippines have been hired to teach in Taiwan in the coming school year, office data showed. Among the first group is 57-year-old
‘ORDINARY PEOPLE’: A man watching Taiwanese military drills said that there would be nothing anyone could do if the situation escalates in the Taiwan Strait Many people in Taiwan look upon China’s military exercises over the past week with calm resignation, doubting that war is imminent and if anything, feeling pride in their nation’s determination to defend itself. After a visit to Taiwan last week by US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, China has sent ships and aircraft across an unofficial buffer between Taiwan and China’s coast and missiles over Taipei and into waters surrounding the nation since Thursday last week. However, Rosa Chang, proudly watching her son take part in Taiwanese military exercises that included dozens of howitzers firing shells into the Taiwan Strait off
Police have detained a Taoyuan couple suspected of over the past two months colluding with human trafficking rings and employment scammers in Southeast Asia to send nearly 100 Taiwanese jobseekers to Cambodia. At a media briefing in Taipei yesterday, the Criminal Investigation Bureau presented items seized from the couple, including alleged victims’ passports, forged COVID-19 vaccination records, mobile phones, bank documents, checks and cash. The man, surnamed Tsai (蔡), and his girlfriend, surnamed Tsan (詹), were taken into custody last month, after police at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport stopped four jobseekers from boarding a flight to Phnom Penh, said Dustin Lee (李泱輯),
RSS