Is anyone worried CECC will use the imported BA.4 and BA.5 cases as an excuse to keep tight border controls?
1 Like
Not an unreasonable concern, IMO. I think theyāre already laying the groundwork for keeping things going to āprotectā against new variants, no?
1 Like
Perhaps the word Control has gone to their heads.
1 Like
I donāt want to know whats going on behind the curtains. There must be a lot of pressure from the travel industry on Taiwans Goverment. Good.
6 Likes
Iām seeing more and more restaurants closing. Only the big chain restaurants will be left at this rate.
3 Likes
Chen will probably learn it the hard way. Once his favourite restaurants have to close, he will give the command to open the border the next day.
1 Like
Most of the restaurants we typically see probably donāt rely too much on the tourist trade: they need local business to survive, not tourists. And official policy hasnāt affected restaurant dining since last summer, I think? Those are being hurt by people hesitant to eat or go out.
Iāve read that a long term shift towards more working from home is hurting restaurants in other countries. I wonder if something similar will happen here.
1 Like
Because the government and media have made them paranoid.
2 Likes
Iām actively avoiding Omicron now but not because I fear it other than it sucks to get sick and having to quarantine if I contract it. For me itās more of a game to see what works and what doesnāt as training for future pandemics. If I can get all the way thru the Covid pandemic unscathed then I figure Iāve got a game plan I can follow when the shit really hits the fan, which it surely will in our lifetimes. A key component of my game plan is not relying on the rational behavior of others for survival in a crisis situation. Iām just going to skip that whole part and do my own thing without having to care what anyone else does. Thatās why I hauled out of Taiwan in early May when the getting was good and am so far out in the Japanese countryside now Iām lucky if I encounter one or two other people a day. Iāll hide out here until early September when I figure the worst will be over in Taiwan, at which point Iāll head back. If I catch Covid then then Iāll have to come up with a better escape plan for the future.
4 Likes
For weeks now, every press conference has had charts emphasizing what a low percentage of people are being seriously affected by the virus. Theyāve been trying to ease fears for the past couple of months, not stoke them.
I canāt speak to what the media have been up to, but from what Iāve seen of TV media here, likely nothing good.
I donāt think avoiding busy restaurants at this stage is the least bit paranoid. The virus is everywhere and people understandably donāt want to get sick, even if itās likely to be mild. Avoiding going out, avoiding even empty restaurants, yeah, thatās excessive - but unfortunately I believe many restaurants need to be crowded at peak times to actually make money.
Then again, I always avoid busy restaurants anyway, so for me itās not a significant behaviour change. But if everyone adopts my habits, the business models of plenty of restaurants may become unsustainable.
2 Likes
Iām still curious how this works; one tweet from todayās press conference provides, um, a bit of an answer, but not much of one.
https://twitter.com/cookiebandit/status/1536234268690567169?s=20&t=FvEWRo8ptUW7iODfq6znPA
1 Like
Two and half years of making people paranoid will take a while to turn around. Avoiding busy restaurants is paranoid, unless one has no concept of risk assessment.
People are afraid of contracting Covid, but only because their fear of the effects of contracting it are wildly at odds with what they actually will experience. Weāre still getting this fear-mongering on here with long Covid.
Restaurateurs going bankrupt is really sad.
5 Likes
Yeah, they may well be doing that now, but itāll take a while to overcome two years of making people paranoid by closing stuff down, border restrictions, pointless spraying, temperature checks, neverending fiddly rule changes, constant government and media reporting of the minutiae of every case, and of course the daily press conferences themselves.
Iāve only been to restaurants a handful of times this year myself (mostly when outside Taipei and before the current outbreak), but I donāt get the impression that many people are avoiding them at the moment, judging by how packed they always seem to be when I pass by. (I also avoid busy restaurants myself, like you.)
4 Likes
Just having the daily presser makes people fearful. They should cancel it unless they have something new for us to do. The only thing new is the constant changing of rules which no one can possibly keep up with.
In the beginning, I remember the 8 guava fruits to signify 8 cases. Then one day we had zero and they could claim victory. Thatās what the original goal of the presser was about and it has lost its meaning.
6 Likes
Unfortunately, restaurateursā lobbyists were not as strong as the hotelsā lobbyists, who forced the hotel quarantine even upon people with their own apartments. So, itās a sheetfest, but hotelsā sheet smells better in the eyes of CECC.
2 Likes
My favorite places used to have an hour wait on Saturday morning. Now, I can walk right in. Iām actively trying to spend more dollars at restaurants and clubs to keep them around. Just talk to the business owner and theyāll tell you how close they are to closing.
10 Likes
Oh, Iād forgotten about that! Theyād have a hard time getting enough guava fruits to do that now. 
1 Like
You have a lot more patience than me, it seems. No chance Iād wait an hour to get in a restaurantā¦
2 Likes
Oh, Iām not saying theyāre doing well at easing fears! But that is the direction theyāre attempting to go.
Iāve got mixed feelings about the press conferences. In general I think communicating information about this is great! But, like you say, its very existence does carry a subtext of āThis is a crisisā, even if the text itself is āRelax, this isnāt a crisis.ā
Like an alarm siren shouting out DONāT PANIC!!! STOP PANICKING!!!
4 Likes
Mmm. guavas. or maybe mangoes, then Iāll show up for the pressers. 
2 Likes