The first batch of COVID-19 vaccines allocated to Taiwan through the COVAX global vaccine-sharing program arrived yesterday, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said, adding that, after testing, it would be able to distribute them by Monday next week at the earliest.
The 199,200 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine were shipped from Amsterdam on a China Airlines (中華航空) plane and arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport at 5:21am.
After the cargo was examined and release procedures were completed at the airport, the Aviation Police Bureau escorted the vehicles carrying the vaccines to a cold chain storage facility.
Photo: Chu Pei-hsiung, Taipei Times
Centers for Disease Control Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥), the Central Epidemic Command Center’s (CECC) spokesperson, said that the batch would expire on May 31, while the AstraZeneca vaccine currently being administered expires on June 15, so the center might consider expanding vaccination eligibility.
Taiwan has so far received 316,200 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, as the first batch that arrived last month comprised 117,000 doses.
The FDA said that it would have to complete a document review and seven types of tests on the new batch of vaccines before releasing them for distribution.
Chuang said that as vaccine recipients are required to receive a second dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine at least eight weeks after the first, the center is leaning toward administering the 199,200 doses of vaccine as a first dose only, in hopes that they would be used up before they expire.
Meanwhile, Taiwan yesterday reported two imported cases of COVID-19: a Taiwanese man who returned on a medical charter flight and an Indonesian student.
The Taiwanese man is in his 60s, works in the Philippines and tested positive for COVID-19 last week after he had a fever on March 23, and also experienced shortness of breath and loss of taste on Monday and Tuesday last week, Chuang said.
The man boarded a medical charter flight on Friday and was hospitalized and tested after arriving in Taiwan on Saturday, he said.
His test for COVID-19 came back positive yesterday, Chuang said, adding that he has pneumonia and is receiving oxygen through a nasal catheter, but does not need a ventilator or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation.
The Indonesian student is in his 20s, arrived in Taiwan on Wednesday, and experienced a fever, runny nose and headache on Friday at a centralized quarantine facility, he said.
The 14 passengers who sat close to him on the flight to Taiwan have been placed under home isolation, Chuang added.
Super Typhoon Kong-rey is the largest cyclone to impact Taiwan in 27 years, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. Kong-rey’s radius of maximum wind (RMW) — the distance between the center of a cyclone and its band of strongest winds — has expanded to 320km, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. The last time a typhoon of comparable strength with an RMW larger than 300km made landfall in Taiwan was Typhoon Herb in 1996, he said. Herb made landfall between Keelung and Suao (蘇澳) in Yilan County with an RMW of 350km, Chang said. The weather station in Alishan (阿里山) recorded 1.09m of
NO WORK, CLASS: President William Lai urged people in the eastern, southern and northern parts of the country to be on alert, with Typhoon Kong-rey approaching Typhoon Kong-rey is expected to make landfall on Taiwan’s east coast today, with work and classes canceled nationwide. Packing gusts of nearly 300kph, the storm yesterday intensified into a typhoon and was expected to gain even more strength before hitting Taitung County, the US Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center said. The storm is forecast to cross Taiwan’s south, enter the Taiwan Strait and head toward China, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The CWA labeled the storm a “strong typhoon,” the most powerful on its scale. Up to 1.2m of rainfall was expected in mountainous areas of eastern Taiwan and destructive winds are likely
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday at 5:30pm issued a sea warning for Typhoon Kong-rey as the storm drew closer to the east coast. As of 8pm yesterday, the storm was 670km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) and traveling northwest at 12kph to 16kph. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 162kph and gusts of up to 198kph, the CWA said. A land warning might be issued this morning for the storm, which is expected to have the strongest impact on Taiwan from tonight to early Friday morning, the agency said. Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) and Green Island (綠島) canceled classes and work
KONG-REY: A woman was killed in a vehicle hit by a tree, while 205 people were injured as the storm moved across the nation and entered the Taiwan Strait Typhoon Kong-rey slammed into Taiwan yesterday as one of the biggest storms to hit the nation in decades, whipping up 10m waves, triggering floods and claiming at least one life. Kong-rey made landfall in Taitung County’s Chenggong Township (成功) at 1:40pm, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The typhoon — the first in Taiwan’s history to make landfall after mid-October — was moving north-northwest at 21kph when it hit land, CWA data showed. The fast-moving storm was packing maximum sustained winds of 184kph, with gusts of up to 227kph, CWA data showed. It was the same strength as Typhoon Gaemi, which was the most
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