CORONAVIRUS/Taiwan reports 10,120 new COVID cases; mask rules to be reviewed in April

02/28/2023 04:21 PM

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A visitor to Da'an Park in Taipei on Tuesday takes a photo of the floral displays set up for the month-long azalea festival which starts on Wednesday. CNA photo Feb. 28, 2023

Taipei, Feb. 28 (CNA) Taiwan's Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) reported 10,120 new cases of COVID-19 and 40 deaths from the disease on Tuesday.

Among the new cases, 9,908 were contracted domestically, which represented a 41.4-percent drop from the same day a week earlier, CECC data showed.

According to CECC spokesman Lo Yi-chun (羅一鈞), the decrease resulted partly from the extended holiday for Tuesday's 228 Peace Memorial Day, during which many medical institutions were closed.

The daily number is expected to rebound to about 15,000-20,000 on Wednesday and Thursday, Lo said.

However, he went on, the local outbreak is declining as expected and the face mask mandate for schools is set to be eased on March 6 as scheduled.

Further easing of COVID-19 restrictions

Asked about Hong Kong's decision to lift its mask mandate Wednesday, Lo said there would be no discussions on whether Taiwan will further ease its mask mandate until mid-April.

Under Hong Kong's new mask rules, people in the former British colony will not have to put on face masks whenever they go indoors, outdoors, or take public transportation, but will still have to wear them in medical institutions.

Lo explained that Taiwan's face-mask mandate was recently relaxed on Feb. 20 to allow people to be mask-free in most indoor settings. The next step will be easing quarantine and reporting rules for people who are infected, he said.

CECC head Victor Wang (王必勝) has said a full lifting of mask requirements could take place in May, but stressed that actual implementation would depend on vaccine coverage and the status of the local outbreak at that point.

To date, Taiwan has recorded 10,043,227 COVID-19 infections and 17,948 deaths from the disease since the pandemic began in early 2020.

The CECC has stopped providing daily information on the age distribution and health status of the deceased and the number of vaccine doses they received. It is also no longer releasing daily infection numbers for each of Taiwan's cities and counties.

(By Chao Yen-hsiang)

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