Taiwan Urges Elderly, Young To Avoid Travelling China Amid Increasing Respiratory Illnesses (Image:Pixabay)
Amid the escalating counts of people affected with respiratory illness in China, the health ministry of Taiwan on Thursday urged elderly and very young of their citizens to avoid travel to China. Usually, senior citizens over the age of 65 and infants have pure immunity and for them chances are high to get affected by the infection. According to certain experts quoted by the news agency Reuters, the move by Taiwan was ineffective to manage public health risks.
The Taiwan administration has been wary of disease outbreaks in its neighbor China including the recent Covid-19 pandemic. In the 2002-2003 outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) that started from China, almost 800 people were killed globally. As said by the Reuters, the Chinese government initially tried to cover up the outbreak then. In their recent official statement, Taiwan stated that due to the rise in respiratory illness in China, the elderly, young children and other people with poor immunity were requested not to travel to the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong, and Macau unless necessary. If travel is necessary, then people should get flu and COVID vaccinations before going to China, it added.
It was only a week before, the World Health Organization (WHO) sought a detailed report from China after the Northern part of the country witnessed an unusual expansion of clusters of respiratory illness and pneumonia in children. China is still recovering from the devastating effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and the health sphere of the country was always on question. The northern provinces of Beijing and Liaoning were on the top of recent outbreak as the hospitals on these areas were overwhelmed by sick children.
The UN health organization then recommended the residents of China to take the precaution measures to reduce the risk of respiratory illness. The measures include “vaccination, keeping distance from people who are ill, staying home when ill, getting tested and medical care as needed, wearing masks as appropriate, ensuring good ventilation, and regular hand-washing”.
As said by the WHO, the Chinese officials associated with the nation’s health commission reported an unusual increase in China’s respiratory illness statistics recently. Beijing projected the reason behind the increase as the dismissal of Covid-19 restrictions and the circulation of known pathogens. Among those mycoplasma pneumoniae is a common bacterial infection which typically affects younger children.
