High COVID transmission rates could last to September: health expert
ROC Central News Agency
04/14/2022 06:01 PM
Taipei, April 14 (CNA) A health expert said Thursday that Taiwan may not see low levels of COVID-19 transmission until September, while highlighting two "weaknesses" the country faces as it shifts from a strategy based on COVID elimination to one based on mitigation.
"The experience of other countries shows that once you ease prevention measures, the number of cases typically rises above 10,000 per day," Lee Ping-ing (李秉穎), convener of Taiwan's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), said during a radio interview.
"The number of cases rises sharply, but then it also declines in a short period of time," said Lee, who is also a pediatric physician at National Taiwan University Hospital.
"Taiwan is in the process of relaxing its prevention measures, but it is doing so in stages and not all at once, as some other countries have done," he said, adding that this will drag out both the rise and fall in daily infection numbers.
A difficult 4-5 months
Lee estimated that Taiwan will go through "a painful period" over the next four to five months, before large-scale community transmission rates give way to lower levels of infection.
The government is considering ways to ease this process, he said, such as possibly reducing the mandatory 10-day quarantine for medical workers exposed to COVID-19, in order to ensure hospitals remain adequately staffed.
According to Lee, Taiwan's two main "weaknesses" as it enters this period are the "relatively low" rates of vaccination among older people and the situation of children aged 5-11, who are not yet eligible to get vaccinated.
According to CECC statistics as of Monday, 79.6 percent of people over the age of 65 have received two COVID-19 vaccine shots, while 64.9 percent have received a third shot.
Among people aged 75 and above, 71.7 percent have received two shots, while 56.1 percent have received a third shot, compared to national rates of 79.0 percent and 52.9 percent, respectively, the data showed.
Meanwhile, Lee spoke at the Central Epidemic Command Center's (CECC) daily press briefing Wednesday to explain how he assessed the risks posed by pediatric COVID-19 cases, as well as the issue of vaccination.
COVID-19 infections among children
According to Lee, of the 1,604 children under the age of 18 who contracted COVID-19 in Taiwan between Jan. 1 and April 13, none of them developed moderate to severe symptoms or died.
In the U.S., by contrast, 962 children under the age of 18 had died of COVID-19 through the end of March, with around 0.01 percent of cases -- or one in 10,000 -- resulting in death, Lee said, citing statistics from the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Based on the U.S. data, it is possible Taiwan will see the number of pediatric COVID-19 deaths rise into double digits as the overall number of cases continues to climb, he said.
Aside from the risk of illness, there is also a significant "social cost" when children are infected or have their school classes suspended, because their parents have to stay home to take care of them, he added.
Vaccinating children aged 5-11
Lee said he believed conditions had changed from late March, when the ACIP decided to temporarily hold off on vaccinating children aged 5-11 against COVID-19, citing insufficient data on whether it was necessary.
At the time, the number of COVID-19 cases in Taiwan was still relatively low, and the government had yet to authorize any COVID-19 vaccines for children in that age group, Lee said, adding that he now believes "the positives" of proceeding with vaccination "outweigh the negatives."
As of Thursday, Taiwan was in negotiations with Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna to purchase vaccines for children aged 5-11, and is preparing to review the companies' applications for emergency use authorization, according to Health Minister Chen Shih-chung (陳時中).
(By Chang Ming-hsuan, Chiang Hui-chun and Matthew Mazzetta)
Enditem/AW
|
NEWSLETTER
|
| Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list |
|
|
|
