Taipei Times
Date: Jan 23, 2020
By: Staff writer, with CNA
People should wear surgical masks and frequently wash their hands to protect against a new type of coronavirus, doctors said on Tuesday after Taiwan confirmed its first case of the virus earlier in the day.
People should avoid visiting Wuhan, China, where the new novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) outbreak is believed to have started last month, Huang Ching-tai (黃景泰), chief of the division of infectious diseases at the department of internal medicine at New Taipei City’s Linkou Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, told reporters.
There is limited knowledge about how the virus is transmitted, but as more than a dozen medical workers in China are confirmed to have contracted it, it is highly likely that the virus is spread by contact, meaning that the infected medical workers might have touched surfaces contaminated by respiratory droplets from infected individuals, Huang said.
People in Taiwan should reduce their visits to crowded places and should wear a surgical mask during such visits, he said. [FULL STORY]