I suggest having a thread solely dedicated to posting the daily pressers and updates to restrictions and level changes WITHOUT comments.
So much important information gets lost in back and forth off topic chit chat.
There are numerous threads that discuss all the topics people chat about here. Do it there.
It gets annoying very fast.
At what point of infections do you consider this is impossible? Remember last time there was a long time of uncontrolled spread, this time they discovered it very early but still each day numbers are rising.
In my opinion this is right about the 10 cases per day mark. Omicron spreads much faster than Alpha. So going back down from 1000 cases is impossible, that is with a lot of measures and testing it seems to still spread. If itās only one more not detected case spreading, and spreading for more time it will be game over. Where do you put the number to give up?
Iām telling you itās game over already. What are you willing to bet?
bad news for our good friend trying to win omicron sweepstakes.
I donāt know. But weāre not at that point yet so, as Iāve said before, I am gonna hold my tongue.
I donāt know if I want to be that confident in drawing such a line. We can only take it day by day.
Maybe they will get it to zero. Maybe it will be merely controlled at a few or tens of cases a day while the lot of us live relatively normally like we are now. But I wanna see what they do. I am confident in their ability to get a handle on the situation one way or another and not just go up on stage like Doctor Tam and declare theyāve already given up at first sight.
A beer? Weāll invite @explant. I owe him one too.
Wow progress. Drive through testing. Something that the world has been doing now for 18 months, fast, easy, safe. Finally here in Taiwan.
Ummā¦ I thought quarantine taxis couldnāt take normal passengers from the get-go. There were a few taxis that I took way back in mid 2020 that went all out with plastic sheets between the back seat and the front, but I thought the drivers were being excessively cautious. Now I realize they might have just dropped someone off for quarantine minutes before I hopped in. So. Many. Holes. Can I reiterate just how much Taiwanās effective COVID management is sheer dumb luck?
Do you need to be reminded that spreading COVID misinformation is punishable by severe fines in the ROC? Will that get you to stop?
This is the thread for that.
Iām not sure what the point of that would be. We already have a restrictions-only thread
Letās not start going hereā¦if something is bothering you in that regard, flag it please.
Itās getting busy all, keep posts to Taiwan-only or use one of the other threads please.
Errā¦couldnāt you just bookmark the CDC website in your browser? Then you would have just the daily updates with no comments. (I thought there is actually another thread for the level changes too.)
well Iām not in Taipei but in Taichung - but of course if Taiwan can get down to zero, or keep it below 50 cases per day for the next 30 days (with testing of course - needs to be at least 2000 local tests not including travelers per day for me to believe they manage it) I do owe you a beer - vs vice versaā¦
Yes I lose if they keep it under 50, but even if they keep it under 50 with level 3 measures - will this be worth it? I donāt think so.
I agree they could get rid of it with full lockdown - only important places people still allowed to go to work, everyone locked in at home. But sorry - for me and most people around that is clearly way worse than even Delta ripping through. And yes I agree to think it makes sense to keep the border closed maybe 2-3 more weeks - so the chance of Delta being imported is lower. Delta cases are still substantial - even though a minority - in the rest of the world.
This is without full lockdown - I guess you agree to this condition as you said there is another way - so the another way cannot be something very similar to what China is doing.
I think the most likely right now is doubling of cases every 2 days. So it will take some time to really rip through. If measures are dropped it could increase to 5-10 times cases per day - it will not be 2000 cases suddenly like last time because last time it spread without any testing for at least 1-2 weeks.
I donāt know if I want to take that bet, itās might get somewhat worse before it gets better. It did take a few months. But my bet would be on performing at the very least a similar trick to last time. We did it without level 4.
It got bad, but they were able to contact-trace themselves out.
But weāve never had a full lockdown. Even in level 3 I was never prevented from going as far as I wanted to.
Next 30 days is a wildcard.
I agree. Level 3 does not count as a lockdown. Chinaās, Australiaās, Canadaās etc stay at home order is what I call a lockdown.
Level 4 is a lockdown.
Weāll see. We have the infrastructure in place nowā¦ soā¦
Why is this a bad thing?
Well I can go to as far as saying it wonāt be possible like the last time - at least not in reality. Because with omicron beeing a flu - if you donāt test - it does not mean that your hospitals get overwhelmed (it could happen - see USA but is very unlikely - as most other countries had dropping hospitalization due to covid and only rising of cases with covid) so if Taiwan decides to simply not test everyone arriving at a hospital - it could go under the radar while actually happening.
The big difference is - last time they discovered it way too late - and it had spread everywhere already. Then level 3 plus testing and contact tracing was able to get rid of it. But with those measures it would not have spread in first place (it was Alpha, it kinda disappeared in summer in many countries)!
This time itās different - itās detected very early - so if early detection and measures are not containing it - there would need to be a change to more strict to actually contain it.
Also Taiwan does not have the testing abilities like for example Austria - where they can test every person in Austria every 3 days with PCR for coronavirus (right now PCR testing about 1/4 of population per day). Such an infrastructure would take several months to build up - plus the higher the prevalence - the harder to run it - as they use pooled testing - and the more positives you have the smaller you need to make the pools. One case per pool means you need to test every person individually - or say cut the group size by 4. So pooling only works well if less than 20% of tests are positive.
So here is my conservative (as in few cases) prediction with level 2: 65536 cases in one month - with 10.000 detected - positivity rate reaching 12% at the one month mark.
with level 3: 35.000 cases with 4000 detected - positivity rate reaching 6% or higher at the one month from now mark - level 3 nationwide
I guess we both agree that this is way above the last time.
and 300.000-1M cases within next 30 days if we drop measures. However hard to say how many detected which will depend on testing strategy. The peak will be reached in 1.5 months (Taiwanese are still so scared it will take longer).
With level 3 - it will take 3-4 months - that is if the numbers are not going way higher than assumed above. And for me the worst case.
The positivity rate is really hard to asses - because the less they test - the higher it will be (assuming everyone with symptoms is tested). 10000 cases or less within one month but positivity rate of 25% - in that case I assume the government of lying or admitting that they test few people positive and there is a huge rate of undetected spread.
2^16? That is ā¦ curiously specific 
I made a very similar prediction to yours a few months back. Looks like I was ahead of the curve. Or as Marco would probably say, even a stopped clock is right twice a day.
The first ones we lost were the throngs of Chinese tourists, who shopped and dined on Chinese invested and controlled hotels and shops.
We lost the tour buses.
We still have economy growth of 5.6, like the quake.
We can still travel abroadā¦if you have the time and money.
No lockdown mandate. Just self caution. Cue in empty Taipei streets without a single order from above.
As the minister Chen said, we will keep on eating indoors until it is deemed that the spread is rising without control. They are extending a lifeline as long as they can to restaurants and small businesses.
They tested 8000 folk. In a day.
Thatās the rub, isnāt it? I donāt know how rich you are or how much time your job allows you off, but most people canāt afford to pay for a rip-off quarantine hotel for 2 weeks (need multiple rooms if thereās multiple family members as no one can stay together), or allow an extra two-three weeks of time off for quarantining on top of the time you need for your holiday? Itās so impractical as to make tourism impossible except for those very rich and lucky. So travel is by default limited to those moving residences or who plan on staying long-term.
That said, I donāt miss the obnoxious Chinese tour buses. In every storm cloud, a silver liningā¦
that is absolutely nothing compared to Europe. Once they test 4-7 Million PCR tests per day they reach parity to Austriaā¦
It just shows they are not prepared if the numbers keep on growing.
Nope they are doing the opposite. For a country with size of Taiwan they could have around 200.000 cases a day without overwhelming hospitalsā¦ Then it would take like 2 months for the worst to be over.
Right now they can save their face and make a turn around due to Omicron. Lotās of smart arguments now that can save your face and make you the hero in 2 months.
If you however impose level 3 - and this goes on for months, then you will lose face and all the previous good efforts will not be considered anymore.
It was not a mistake to aim for Zero Covid, not even to try to maintain it as long as possible. It is a mistake to keep on continuing with it if you need level 3 which is much more severe than what most of Europe is doing!