Free to roam even if they live with a case.
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Another friend sent me a box of 50 or so tests I’ll never use. Not a peep from customs.
It’s now legal to import the test kits. If you want use them, consider donating them. I donated the 75 I imported + some more that I have been buying regularly from 7-11. I donated them to a remote school for use by disadvantaged students. The school was happy to cooperate in managing the logistics.
(The gist of the post is each person can import 100 or less kits – only once though – and cannot sell them, as that is illegal)
Edit: only legal until the end of June.
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Current situation: MONDAY - my niece (3 yrs old) had high fever yesterday and immediately use the suppository to lessen her fever, put wet towel on her forehead, put sweater on her and pajama, then with home kit test and she was positive. And me was worried and shouted to everyone - “quick wear your mask”.
My son scramble to my laptop and to schedule her for PCR test.
I message my boss that I will be late due to this issue (she said just wear a mask and don’t get sick… company needs you) F…k
On the way to work - wearing 2 medical mask, son call me and unable to get taxi for Tuesday (that’s today) this was the issue we don’t own a scooter nor bicycle. So I canvass for bike with toddler seat found one and one for myself just in case we all need to go (son help to drive home 1 bicycle and me manage to get home alive as I’m not expert on cycling).
Boss was quite mad on me as I didn’t show up for work yesterday.
Now, Tuesday I test myself and still negative (hoping I was positive though)
I got lengthy speech from my boss (actually I did told her she is not happy on me so how about look for a new one to handle this job with not so many issues). And the lengthy speech on and on like a broken long playing album.
She keep saying to me - you are not allowed to get sick.
Business will turn kaput.
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Sounds like you need a new job
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This is the feeling both my wife and I are getting from our bosses. Bosses should be thankful that they got through the past 2 years without having to deal with the worst of the pandemic and even though they’ve had plenty of time to prepare, most haven’t, clearly. We cannot control the spread of the virus, our proximity to others who have it, or the CDC’s guidelines to lessen danger to the public and vulnerable. Sounds like you have an extremely high chance of getting it.
If an employer doesn’t respect their employees, they deserve to go out of business.
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She knows the rule of CDC and she insist that as long as i’m negative can work.
Already told her when my son was first diagnose and she nags on me.
Just go in without a mask and start coughing on her.
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I was an idiot: I reported a positive self-test and arranged a telehealth appointment (done through the EUCare app). Paperwork still has to be filed so this isn’t final yet, but it looks like this is the timeline:
- Tuesday night (is that Day 1? Or Day 0? Not sure how to count this): initial scratch in throat.
- Wednesday morning (Day 2): yup, I’m sick. Feels like a cold the day before you show visible symptoms: mild fog in the head, scratch in the throat, occasional mild coughing. That first day or two when you feel sick, but you don’t look sick to anyone else. Resting heart rate, for pretty much this day only, jumped from usual 57-59 up to 69-70. Ear themometer didn’t indicate a fever.
- Thursday (Day 3): still feels the same in the morning. What the heck, take this self-test. I like to know these things. “Wait 10-15 minutes to see if lines appear.” “Oo, that took less than a minute, didn’t it?” “Hey, at least now I can be pretty sure I’m not going to catch this when it’s really important, in July, when I’m about to fly to Canada. I don’t want to have to reschedule that!” (Another reason I waited till Thursday: that was the day the self-testing protocols started and I knew I didn’t need to feel the least obliged to go get a PCR test and suffer something like what @The_Ghost went through.)
- Later Thursday: I experience a mix of idle curiosity (mildly dangerous) and desire to do what it seems we’re supposed to (sometimes very dangerous): figure out this EUCare app and arrange an appointment. Earliest available time is Saturday morning.
- Thursday evening: symptoms mostly abate. Since then, it’s just been a mild scratch in the throat, the kind you’ve got four or five days after a cold mostly fades.
- Saturday morning (Day 5): health appointment, done through the app on my phone. Technology seems pretty good, actually. I unwisely had my wife in the room to help, so there were ten seconds of English at the start and the rest was in Chinese so I missed a lot. The doctor says I’ll be entered in the system (that was one of my main reasons for doing this: I wanted a record that I’d caught this, in case that proves useful later down the line). I’ll get a message on my phone and will have to upload information. He thinks my seven-day quarantine will likely start tomorrow - not the day of first symptoms, not the day of the positive test, but actually Day 6 of (now mostly gone) symptoms, Day 4 if the positive test counts as Day 1.
Hopefully this turns out inaccurate and the quarantine will be backdated somewhat. But at the moment I feel like I total chump for reporting this. If I were having more serious symptoms, sure, reporting makes sense, but I wish I’d just looked at the self-test, kept quiet about it, and stayed home until the following Wednesday or so.
For those who catch the reference, I’m feeling a bit like Jim Holden on his more foolish days at the moment.
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What does your wife say?
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And: has she also tested positive?
I hope you’re both doing OK.
Guy
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The people i know who got the virus are doing 3+4 all on their own, no reporting and starting from when they test positive on the rapid test. I bet this is very widespread now.
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I wish I’d followed this path, although I think 3+4 is a little too cavalier; I was figuring more like 6+7 (mind you, since I’m now working from home, staying away from the office is no issue for either me or my employer). But I still haven’t got the assorted notifications from the CDC (?) about what comes next for me. I hope I’m worrying unnecessarily about an extended quarantine period that hasn’t even started yet.
My wife doesn’t even want to do the test - I mildly disapprove of that, but I can see the logic to it. Given she’s in a near constant state of mild coughs and headaches from hay fever or allergies or sleep deprivation (it’s the Taiwanese way!) or whatever, she hasn’t noticed anything dramatically different in the past week, but she suspects she caught it from work and was sick last weekend. I’m hoping I caught it from her, and that she doesn’t start to get ill in another day or two.
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Guys if you are talking 3+4, that was for contacts. Now that has been scrapped and it is 7 day self management unless children/elderly/immunocompromised. Or you are living together with the case.
If you are sick, that is a whole different enchilada, it is at least 7 days from report day.
Reporting entitles you to special care, work allowances, heck at least a package of moody and cookies from the city. Plus if you go abroad you have as said a certificate that says you already had it
Your report is appreciated say if you have a cluster at work or residence that requires special attention or you came in contact with people in risk categories. Moreover, you really do not know if it might get worse and you could require the special medication.
Yes, I know Taiwanese workers are trucking on and bosses are pushing the it is just a cold. Many workers do not have a choice. And there is the stigma of the disease: people are being bullied and will probably be fired the first chance bosses have. That does not make it right to gamble with your life and that of others. The spread is too wide.
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I think this isn’t quite right. If I’ve got it right:
- The only close contacts now are those who are living together. If you’re not living together, you don’t count as a close contact.
- For those close contacts, i.e. people living with a positive case (you’re welcome, darling wife!): it’s 3+4 if you’re not boosted, but 0+7 if you are boosted. I’m not sure if any other contacts have any kind of isolation these days: just those who live with a positive case and aren’t boosted.
Unfortunately this is the best support I can find for my admittedly shaky memory (source):
The “3+4” isolation protocol requires a person who is a close contact of somebody who tested positive for COVID-19 to quarantine at home for three days, followed by four days of “self-initiated epidemic prevention,” which allows the person to leave home but only after following or meeting certain guidelines.
Under the new “0+7” rules, the individuals who have received three shots of a COVID-19 vaccine will no longer have to isolate for three days if someone in their household tests positive for the disease
God I wish there were a clear list of the rules somewhere in English … I search but is a Focus Taiwan article from three weeks ago still valid? I can’t tell! My best source of information is buried deep in an article about insurance?!
Judging purely from interactions with my students, there fortunately seems to be much less of this stigma than there was a month ago, thank goodness. But it is a factor in why I reported and why I’m talking about my own experiences with my students. I’m all for caution with this thing - but there’s still too much unnecessary and unhelpful fear.
And non-boosted. Edit. Already mentioned.
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Things have changed fast.
Three weeks ago, we had a case at kindergarten. They closed the whole school, not just the class, for three days and hired the bug sprayers, I mean professional cleaners.
Now….they are finding ways to bend the rules to not close classes for three days even if the case was in that class.
Too many people have it. Half the teachers at the school had a week off. The manager made a big deal saying that she wants people to take 14 days, not seven because she wants to keep the kids safe.
Well that plan lasted about a day. No teachers. Now, people are doing the minimum required. Seven days, test and come back.
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Which is what I said. Keep reading.
The important issue is 3+4 is not for people who are confirmed sick. Unless you add 3+4= 7.
Some workplaces might even ask for your tests not to come up positive.
Focus Taiwan and even Taiwan News published English version. Someone posted this elsewhere but again, the important stuff gets drowned in complaining…
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OK. I guess I misunderstood.
Oh, there have been countless versions. But the rules keep changing and as far as I know there’s no page with “Current rules.” I search Focus Taiwan and I find the rules as of the date of that article - but have they been updated since then? Hard to tell.
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Well some have changed for the better. Instead of 10 days, you get 7 if mild/asymptomatic.
Your direct contacts 3+4. Your not so close 7 monitor days.
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