Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Pitfalls of corporate jab donations

Chang Kuo-tsai 張國財

Hon Hai Precision Industry Co founder Terry Gou (郭台銘) and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) on July 2 reached initial agreements and signed legal documents with Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical Group, the distributor for the BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine in Taiwan, China, Hong Kong and Macau, with both firms purchasing 5 million doses each.

On Sunday, China’s Xinhua news agency reported that Gou’s Yonglin Foundation and TSMC on Friday reached advance arrangements with Shanghai Fosun’s subsidiary Fosun Industrial Co to buy vaccines, which would be supplied to Taiwan through normal commercial procedures.

Registration opens to 18-49 age group

Taipei Times

Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung, who heads the Central Epidemic Command Center, at a news conference in Taipei yesterday thanks Japan for donating AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines to Taiwan.
Photo courtesy of the CECC

The Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) yesterday expanded registration for the national online COVID-19 vaccination booking system to include people aged 18 to 49.

Virus briefings are not created equal

Chang Yueh-han 張約翰

As a Taipei resident, I began in May to watch the Central Epidemic Command Center’s (CECC) news briefing every day, and I have also followed the Taipei City Government’s news conferences.

In my former career, I worked in media, where I learned that news conferences must have a specific goal. Pandemic briefings must provide timely, adequate information and clearly explain the measures implemented by health officials so that the public can understand the virus, as well as the measures’ purpose and details. The briefings should help the public to understand the virus and cooperate with disease prevention measures.

Gene harvesting a security concern

Taipei Times Editorial

Over the past few years, inexpensive data storage coupled with advancements in supercomputers and artificial intelligence (AI) analytics have allowed the exploitation of population data in ways that megalomaniac technocrats and totalitarian dictators could only have dreamed of just a decade or two ago.

US government advisers in March said that Chinese firm BGI Group was constructing a vast bank of genomic data that, combined with AI tools, would allow China to monopolize the global pharmaceutical industry, “build” genetically enhanced soldiers and — most concerning of all — engineer pathogens to empower ethnically targeted bioweapons.

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