Taiwan urges elderly, young to avoid China visits due to respiratory
illnesses
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[November 30, 2023]
By Ben Blanchard and Andrew Silver
TAIPEI/SHANGHAI (Reuters) -Taiwan's health ministry on Thursday urged
the elderly, very young and those with poor immunity to avoid travel to
China due to the recent increase in respiratory illnesses there, a move
some experts said was ineffective to manage public health risks.
The World Health Organization (WHO) last week requested China provide
detailed information on the spike, which a WHO official said was not as
high as before the COVID-19 pandemic and that no unusual or novel
pathogens had been detected.
Taiwan has been wary of disease outbreaks in its giant neighbour since
the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak that started in
China and killed nearly 800 people globally in 2002-2003.
China, whose government claims democratically governed Taiwan as its
own, initially tried to cover up that outbreak.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2023/Nov/30/images/ads/current/peasley_sda_HFH_2023.png)
In a statement released after a weekly Cabinet meeting, Taiwan's health
ministry said that due to the rise in respiratory illnesses in China,
the elderly, young children and other people with poor immunity are
requested not to travel to mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau unless
necessary.
If travel is necessary, then people should get flu and COVID
vaccinations before going to China, it added.
Shu-Ti Chiou, an epidemiologist at the Health & Sustainable Development
Foundation in Taipei, said the advisory would lead the public to
mistakenly believe they would not contract respiratory illnesses as long
as they did not go to China.
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![](../images/113023PIX/health26.jpg)
People wait for their rides outside a children's hospital in
Beijing, China November 27, 2023. REUTERS/Tingshu Wang/File Photo
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2023/Nov/30/images/ads/current/debbiesfloral_lda_112023.png) Rajib Dasgupta, an epidemiologist
and professor of community health at Jawaharlal Nehru University in
New Delhi, also said "travel restrictions for respiratory infections
are not an effective measure for interrupting transmission".
Some public health researchers said the travel advisory was
reasonable, saying Taiwan was also likely to experience a surge in
respiratory illnesses in winter and following the lifting of
pandemic restrictions. "They would be cautious not to hasten it by
overseas travels," said Sung-il Cho, an epidemiologist at Seoul
National University.
China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Wednesday that the rise in
respiratory illnesses in China was a common issue faced by all
countries and that Chinese authorities have it under effective
control.
China's Taiwan affairs office and authorities in Hong Kong and Macau
did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
(Reporting by Ben Blanchard in Taipei and Andrew Silver in Shanghai;
Additional reporting by Anne Marie Roantree and Farah Master in Hong
Kong; Editing by Miral Fahmy)
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