Starting from April 8, people aged 65 and older, indigenous people aged 55 to 64, children younger than six months old and people who are immunocompromised would be eligible for a booster shot of a vaccine against the JN.1 subvariant of SARS-CoV-2, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday.
The booster shot should only be taken 180 days after their previous shot, CDC Deputy Director-General Tseng Shu-hui (曾淑惠) said.
While a vaccine of the JN.1 variant was administered as of Oct. 1 last year, its protection wanes over time, she said.
Photo courtesy of the Centers for Disease Control
The CDC cited the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s guidelines that people in the targeted groups receive another booster shot.
The immunocompromised group includes people undergoing or who have undergone immunosuppressive therapy, chemotherapy or radiation therapy within the past year or who are taking immunosuppressive medication; people who have had organ transplant or stem-cell transplant surgery; people who have medium or severe congenital immunodeficiency; people who are on dialysis; those who have HIV; and other cases as deemed necessary by a doctor, Tseng said.
Six new severe cases of COVID-19 and one death were reported last week, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said.
From September last year to yesterday, 522 cases of severe local cases of COVID-19 were reported, 112 of which resulted in death, Lee said.
Most cases involved people aged 65 and older or those with chronic diseases, she said.
All new strains reported over the past four weeks were of the SARS-CoV-2 XEC variant, including the JN.1, LP.8.1 and others, she said.
CDC data showed that 2.04 million people have been vaccinated against JN.1, 1.91 million of which used Moderna vaccines and 127,000 used Novavax vaccines.
The nation has a sufficient supply of JN.1 vaccines, with Moderna and Novavax options available for people aged 12 and older, Lee said, adding that children aged six months to 11 years old would only be vaccinated with Moderna vaccines.
Hospitals reported 108,000 emergency room visits for influenza-like illnesses last week, indicating a downward trend, the CDC said.
Emergency rooms admitted 211,000 people with diarrhea-like illnesses, down 18.4 percent from the previous week, but still the highest for the same period over the past five years, it said.
The number of diarrhea clusters in the past four weeks, 242, is also the highest for the same period, it said.
Most outbreaks occur at hotels and eateries, with the majority, 98.7 percent, affected by norovirus, it said, urging people to take necessary precautions.
A magnitude 5.7 earthquake struck off Taitung County at 1:09pm today, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The hypocenter was 53km northeast of Taitung County Hall at a depth of 12.5km, CWA data showed. The intensity of the quake, which gauges the actual effect of a seismic event, measured 4 in Taitung County and Hualien County on Taiwan's seven-tier intensity scale, the data showed. The quake had an intensity of 3 in Nantou County, Chiayi County, Yunlin County, Kaohsiung and Tainan, the data showed. There were no immediate reports of damage following the quake.
A BETRAYAL? It is none of the ministry’s business if those entertainers love China, but ‘you cannot agree to wipe out your own country,’ the MAC minister said Taiwanese entertainers in China would have their Taiwanese citizenship revoked if they are holding Chinese citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said. Several Taiwanese entertainers, including Patty Hou (侯佩岑) and Ouyang Nana (歐陽娜娜), earlier this month on their Weibo (微博) accounts shared a picture saying that Taiwan would be “returned” to China, with tags such as “Taiwan, Province of China” or “Adhere to the ‘one China’ principle.” The MAC would investigate whether those Taiwanese entertainers have Chinese IDs and added that it would revoke their Taiwanese citizenship if they did, Chiu told the Chinese-language Liberty Times (sister paper
The Chinese wife of a Taiwanese, surnamed Liu (劉), who openly advocated for China’s use of force against Taiwan, would be forcibly deported according to the law if she has not left Taiwan by Friday, National Immigration Agency (NIA) officials said yesterday. Liu, an influencer better known by her online channel name Yaya in Taiwan (亞亞在台灣), obtained permanent residency via marriage to a Taiwanese. She has been reported for allegedly repeatedly espousing pro-unification comments on her YouTube and TikTok channels, including comments supporting China’s unification with Taiwan by force and the Chinese government’s stance that “Taiwan is an inseparable part of China.” Liu
MINOR DISRUPTION: The outage affected check-in and security screening, while passport control was done manually and runway operations continued unaffected The main departure hall and other parts of Terminal 2 at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport lost power on Tuesday, causing confusion among passengers before electricity was fully restored more than an hour later. The outage, the cause of which is still being investigated, began at about midday and affected parts of Terminal 2, including the check-in gates, the security screening area and some duty-free shops. Parts of the terminal immediately activated backup power sources, while others remained dark until power was restored in some of the affected areas starting at 12:23pm. Power was fully restored at 1:13pm. Taoyuan International Airport Corp said in a
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