Focus Taiwan
Date: 02/24/2020
By: Chiu Chun-chin, Chen Wei-ting and Evelyn Kao

Taipei, Feb. 24 (CNA) A Taiwanese child with hemophilia and his mother who had been trapped in coronavirus-stricken Hubei province arrived at Taoyuan International Airport at around 10:45 p.m. Monday on a flight flown by EVA Airways.

The Taiwanese minor and his mother were left stranded in the city of Jingmen, which has been sealed off since Jan. 24 due to the novel coronavirus outbreak, after they were not included on an evacuation flight from nearby Wuhan to Taiwan on Feb. 3.

The child had reportedly run out of hemophilia medication after not being put on the flight, but was helped by a Taiwanese businessman who works in the area.

He traveled 500 kilometers to pick up the medicine in Zhengzhou after it was delivered there from Taiwan and brought it back to the mother of the sick child on Feb. 9.    [FULL  STORY]

FAMILY CLUSTER: The latest confirmed cases are the younger son and wife of a hospitalized octogenarian who on Sunday was confirmed to be the nation’s 27th case

Taipei Times
Date: Feb 25, 2020
By: Lee I-chia  /  Staff reporter

The government’s travel notice for South Korea has been raised to a level 3 “warning” — avoid all

nonessential travel — due to a jump in the number of COVID-19 cases there, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said yesterday, adding that two more cases have been confirmed in Taiwan.

The community spread of the virus in South Korea has been shown by the rapid increase in confirmed cases in the past few days, which totaled 763 yesterday, Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中) said.

“As the risk of infection is elevated in the country, the center decided to raise the travel notice to level 3,” said Chen, who serves as the center’s head. “We recommend people avoid all nonessential travel.”

As of 12am today, all foreign nationals arriving in Taiwan from South Korea would be placed under a 14-day mandatory home quarantine, he said.    [FULL  STORY]

• An extended Lunar New Year holiday provides people from the self-ruled island with the opportunity to rethink their careers as the death toll from the deadly infection continues to rise
• Online poll finds 63 per cent of Taiwanese unwilling to return to mainland China over health concerns

South China Morning Post
Date: 23 Feb, 2020
By: Lawrence Chung

Taiwanese account manager Douglas Liu values his life more than his job, which is why he will be staying at home on Monday rather than going back to work in the mainland China city of Suzhou.

Liu returned to his home in Taipei on January 10 for an extended 

Lunar New Year 

 holiday – and to vote in the island’s presidential election – and planned to go back to work on February 1. But as the 

coronavirus epidemic 

 worsened, the 45-year-old changed his plans.

“Last week, my company told me I should resume work on February 24, but after I argued in vain over the risk of returning to Suzhou, I tendered my resignation,” he said. “After all, my life is more important.”

Liu works for a firm that manufactures chest freezers for the mainland Chinese market.
[FULL  STORY]

Event marked the incident but also emphasized importance of human rights and transitional justice now

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/02/23
By:  Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — More than 40 civil and student groups marched on the streets of Taipei Saturday afternoon (Feb. 22) in commemoration of the 228 Incident – the island-wide suppression of civilians who protested against the Kuomintang (KMT) government that eventually led to tens of thousands of deaths — seven decades ago.

Marching before the 73rd anniversary of the 228 Incident, organizers said the event was intended to encourage the public to remain aware of the tragedy and its impact on society. It was also a timely reminder to the government to persist in the work of transitional justice.

The organizers called on the government to put more emphasis on human rights issues. Laws and regulations related to human rights, including the Refugee Act, should be legislated for or reformed, said the organizers.

This is the fourth consecutive year that Professor Chen Wen-Chen’s Memorial Foundation has organized the march, in partnership with other groups, with the theme this year being “Refuse to forget, insist on resisting.” A number of lawmakers also took part in the event.
[FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 02/23/2020
By: Phoenix Hsu and Evelyn Kao

Taipei, Feb. 23 (CNA) The Ministry of Education has been distributing 6.45 million surgical masks to schools at the kindergarten to grade 12 level (K-12) and to after-school institutions, as part of the government efforts to contain the novel coronavirus as the spring semester is about to start.

With K-12 schools set to open Feb. 25 after a two-week delay, the ministry is also supplying them with 250,000 forehead thermometers and 84,000 liters of alcohol-based sanitizers.

Of the 6.45 million allocated face masks, 500,000 are being given to private kindergartens, 770,000 to after-school tutoring institutions and child care centers, and 5.18 million to K-12 schools, Huang Wen-ling (黃雯玲), head of the MOE's Department of Planning, told CNA Sunday.

The masks are for "backup" purposes and should be used only in emergency situations, such as if a child or teacher develops a fever, cough, sore throat or respiratory symptoms, Huang said.
[FULL  STORY]

FATHER AND SON: The CECC suspects a younger brother, who had a meal with some friends back from China late last month, might be the source of the latest infections

Taipei Times
Date: Feb 24, 2020
By: Lee I-chia  /  Staff reporter

The nation’s 27th and 28th confirmed cases of COVID-19 were announced by the Central

Epidemic Command Center (CECC) yesterday, which also issued a level 1 “watch” travel notice for Italy and Iran amid reports of a rapid rise in confirmed cases in the two nations.

The 27th case is a man in his 80s who has chronic hypertension and diabetes and is on dialysis, but has not been abroad recently, while the 28th case is his son, who is in his 50s and lives with his father, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥) said.

The older man began suffering coughs and a runny nose on Feb. 6 and was hospitalized for pneumonia in a single-room ward after he developed a fever on Feb. 9, Chuang said.

He was transferred to an intensive care unit on Sunday last week and moved to a negative pressure isolation ward on Thursday for suspected tuberculosis, he said.    [FULL  STORY]

WCCFtech
Date: Feb 22, 2020
By: Sam Reynolds

A subsidiary of Gigabyte Technology has been fined by regulators in Taiwan for exporting products to Iran via Hong Kong without the proper permits.

Local media reports in Taiwan say that one of Gigabyte's subsidiaries responsible for manufacturing network and telecommunications equipment shipped "strategic high-tech goods" to Iran without the proper permits. While Gigabyte operates a branch office in Iran, and sells many of its products including servers and motherboards within the country, it hasn't applied for an export permit for telecommunications equipment from Taiwan's Bureau of Foreign Trade.

Alibaba Earnings Preview: Is The Market is Still Gaga for $BABA?

Police searched one of Gigabyte's offices earlier in the week and interviewed a number of key staff and managers. Yi Tai Li, the subsidiary's director, was released on a 200,000 NTD bond ($6500), while a subordinate was released after paying a 50,000 NTD ($1,644) bond.  [FULL  STORY]

Eurogamer
Date: 22 February 2020
By: Wesley Yin-Poole, Deputy Editor

Devotion has secured its future at Harvard University a year after it was pulled from Steam.

The superb horror game, developed by Taiwan studio Red Candle Games, launched on Steam in the spring of 2019, but after it was found to contain an unflattering reference to China's president, Xi Jinping, it sparked an outcry among Chinese players that led to the withdrawal of its Chinese distributors, the closure of Red Candle's account on Weibo, one of China's largest social media platforms, and the removal of the game from Steam.

A year later, and with a re-release looking unlikely, Red Candle has finally found a home for Devotion – the Harvard-Yenching Library at Harvard University.

Both Devotion and its predecessor Detention have been added to the library's collection, Red Candle said in a post on Facebook. The move preserves both titles when there was fear they could be lost.
[FULL  STORY]

Results from second round of tests for Taiwanese transported back home from cruise ship expected Sunday afternoon

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/02/22
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The Taiwanese passengers and crew from the Diamond Princess who arrived in Taiwan late Friday (Feb. 21) all tested negative for the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19), with the results of a second test expected Sunday afternoon (Feb. 23).

A total of 19 Taiwanese passengers and crew members and one doctor flew from Tokyo to Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport on a China Airlines charter. They were subjected to two rounds of tests and are expected to start a 14-day quarantine period.

The first tests took place on Friday at 11:30 p.m. immediately after members of the group were transferred to three hospitals, CNA reported.

The Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) announced Saturday afternoon that all the tests had shown negative for the virus. A second round of tests were taken after 11:30 p.m. Saturday, with results expected Sunday afternoon.    [FULL  STORY]

0Focus Taiwan
Date: 02/22/2020
By: Chang Ming-hsuan and Matthew Mazzetta

Taipei, Feb. 22 (CNA) Taiwan's Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said Saturday that it has planned a series of response measures, in the event that the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) begins to spread at the community level.

At a press conference, Shih Chung-liang (石崇良), director general of the department of Medical Affairs at the Ministry of Health and Welfare, said the CECC's four-part prevention plan is based on Taiwan's experience of dealing with the 2003-2004 outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS).

The first part of the plan will deal with prevention efforts, since any community level transmission would cause a sudden spike in the number of confirmed cases, he said, but did not elaborate.

Second, new rules will be introduced to minimize the risk of infection among healthcare workers, Shih said.    [FULL  STORY]