health policies – Taiwan Insight

Breaking Down the Wall: Generational Gaps, Generational Prejudice and HIV Treatment in Taiwan

7 June 2022 samluowei

Written by Geng-Hui Lin. Compared to HIV risk, which is assessed through responses to a CDC survey, age is a relatively inflexible criterion for MSM’s who want to obtain PrEP through Taiwan’s PrEP program. There are ways to be categorised as an elevated risk for HIV infection depending on your answers to the CDC’s HIV risk assessment. As a result of these criteria, although some MSM’s over thirty-five have been enrolled in the program, access and availability remain mostly limited to those under this age. This leaves older MSM’s as outsiders to the program, unable to enter.

Taiwan’s Covid-19 Surge: From “Zero-Covid” to “Living with Covid”

27 May 2022 samluowei

Written by Tsung-Mei Cheng. Time will tell how quickly Taiwan can bring the Covid surge under control. However, the fundamentals that worked so well for Taiwan before the surge—preparedness (a national plan), universal health coverage, advanced IT and communications infrastructure, and a cooperating public—should continue to serve Taiwan well in the fight against the current surge. Moreover, it will hopefully also defend us against future variants of the Covid-19 coronavirus to come.

Taiwan’s ongoing war against Covid-19: Sixteen months of smooth sailing and one recent squall

21 July 2021 Editor

Written by Tsung-Mei Cheng. For much of the past eighteen months, the world has been under siege from the Covid-19 pandemic. Since January 2020, when the novel virus was first reported, the scourge has claimed more than four million lives and 189 million confirmed cases around the globe. In the Covid-19 saga spanning continents, damaging economies, and taking lives, Taiwan stood out as a poster child of success in preventing large outbreaks and keeping its economy growing at the same time.

The Professional Predicament of Taiwanese Physical Therapists’ in dealing with the World’s Most Restrictive Referral Model

9 October 2020 Editor

Written by Wei-hong Chen. According to the 2019 survey from the World Confederation of Physical Therapy, in 79% of its member countries, (as Australia and Canada, and the UK,) PTs can provide services without supervision from a doctor. Taiwan falls into the minority of countries in which PTs can only operate under a Doctor’s orders. This restricted referral model is enforced in legal and medical systems, and as a result, the quality of physical therapy in Taiwan has been seriously hindered.

Sustaining Taiwan’s High-Performing National Health Insurance: A Call to Invest in Health

8 October 2020 Editor

Written By Tsung-Mei Cheng. As recent as the end of 2019, Taiwan’s public gave the NHI a 90% satisfaction rating. The questions at hand are: how will Taiwan’s public and their representatives in parliament respond to the urgent need to balance NHI’s budget in the near-immediate term? Moreover, how will they help build a health system of greater efficiency and quality in the longer term by agreeing to pay more for the health care they have come to expect?

The Memeification of Chen Shih-chung

11 May 2020 Editor

Written by Sam Robbins. Currently, if you visit the Department of Sociology at National Taiwan University, you will be greeted by a cartoon cut out of Taiwan’s Minister of Health and Welfare, Chen Shih-chung (陳時中). The Cartoon tells you to use your card to buzz in and to get your temperature checked. If you are a user of popular social messaging app Line, you can now download a package of cartoon stickers of Chen accompanied with messages like, “stand together and defeat the virus” (團結對抗，戰勝病毒).

THE CORONAVIRUS IS AN OPPORTUNITY FOR TAIWAN'S DISEASE PREVENTION DIPLOMACY

31 March 2020 Editor

Written by Abby Huang. Since COVID-19 began spreading across Europe in February, the name “Taiwan” leapt on to the mastheads of major news organizations. One after another, international press published reports on Taiwan’s disease prevention measures and compared them with those of their own countries.

How Taiwan Used Big Data, Transparency and a Central Command to Protect Its People from Coronavirus

12 March 2020 Editor

Written by Beth Duff-Brown. Within the last five weeks the Taiwan epidemic command center rapidly implemented those 124 action items, including border control from the air and sea, case identification using new data and technology, quarantine of suspicious cases, educating the public while fighting misinformation, negotiating with other countries — and formulating policies for schools and businesses to follow.