CECC finds link between Kaohsiung COVID-19 cluster, previous cases
ROC Central News Agency
03/07/2022 05:58 PM
Taipei, March 7 (CNA) Taiwan's Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) reported two new domestic COVID-19 cases on Monday, both related to a cluster involving a family in Kaohsiung and a tour group.
The CECC also found a possible link between this cluster and a different cluster infection centered in northern Taiwan, Health and Welfare Minister Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who heads the CECC, said at a press briefing Monday.
Link between clusters
The first case in the cluster, reported Friday, is an employee at a Kaohsiung buffet restaurant. Her parents, who have also tested positive, participated in a tour group from Feb. 20 to Feb. 22, of which two members from New Taipei and Tainan were subsequently confirmed to have COVID-19 as well.
The two new domestic cases reported Monday were relatives of the Tainan resident, both of whom had received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, bringing the total number of cases in the cluster to 11, Chen said.
According to local health authorities, the New Taipei resident who took part in the tour group paid a visit on Feb. 19 to a woman who tested positive for COVID-19 four days later, Chen said.
The woman's infection is connected to a separate cluster, of which the first reported case was an interior designer in New Taipei and the majority of cases are members of a religious group who dined together in February, Chen said.
As the genome sequence of patients in the two clusters are a match, the CECC has concluded that the New Taipei resident likely contracted the disease from the woman and later infected other members of the tour group, Chen said.
Local health authorities are still looking into why the New Taipei resident was not placed in quarantine after the woman she had visited later tested positive, Chen said.
Although the CECC has found a connection between the two clusters, it has not yet been able to identify the original source of the clusters, he added.
The figures do not include imported cases reclassified as domestic ones, nor retroactively removed cases. As of March 7, Taiwan recorded 861 domestic cases in 2022, while the total number of imported cases rose to 5,351 from 2,375 on Dec. 31.
Other clusters
Currently, the CECC is monitoring three clusters of unknown origin in Taiwan, after finding the likely infection source of two individual cases, a marine surveyor and a nurse at a Taipei quarantine hotel, CECC official Lo Yi-chun (羅一鈞) said.
The marine surveyor was likely infected by crew members of a ship he inspected who tested positive for COVID-19 on Sunday, Lo said, adding that the viral levels in the crew members were too low to confirm this hypothesis via genome sequencing.
The nurse was infected by a traveler she helped test at the hotel, an Indonesian man who tested positive on Feb. 18, based on genome sequencing results, Lo said.
Imported cases
In addition to the domestic cases, the CECC also reported 27 imported cases on Monday, 13 of whom tested positive on arrival in Taiwan. The CECC did not release any information regarding the vaccination status of the imported cases.
To date, Taiwan has confirmed 20,869 COVID-19 cases since the pandemic began in early 2020, including 15,464 domestically transmitted infections.
With no deaths reported Monday, the number of confirmed COVID-19 fatalities in the country remained at 853.
(By Chiang Yi-ching)
Enditem/HY
1. More doses of the Moderna and Pfizer-BNT vaccine have been administered in Taiwan than the government has officially received because recipients of the Moderna booster shot are given half the standard dose of the first and second jab, while medical workers can sometimes get more than the standard number of shots from a Pfizer-BNT vial. 2. Information about the booster dose and additional dose can be found at https://t.ly/4ZuW
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