Taiwan does not intend to return to China’s “cruel” lockdowns to curb the spread of COVID-19 on the island, Premier Su Tseng-chang said during a Sunday visit to Taiwan’s Centers for Disease Control.
The premier’s remarks come amid a surge in COVID-19 infections and an accompanying demand for tests on the island of 23 million.
Su remarked that their containment efforts, although not comparable to that of Shanghai, have been “praised by the world.”
“We will not lock down the country and cities as cruelly as China,” Su said.
China’s Taiwan Affairs Office argued last week that the government’s departure from the ‘zero-COVID’ policy will result in many deaths.
However, Chen Shih-chung, health minister of the island, noted in a Thursday briefing that 99.7% of the cases in the current outbreak either had no symptoms or had mild symptoms.
At least 858 COVID-19-related deaths have been logged on the island, as of this article’s publication.
The current COVID-19 vaccination rate among those older than 75 years of age is 72.5%. Only some 59.1% of that same group have received their COVID-19 vaccine booster jab.