COVID-19 may become as common as the flu. That was the word on Tuesday from Health Minister Chen Shih-chung who said that possibility is becoming more and more likely.
On Monday, Hong Kong saw its first documented case of a reinfection of COVID-19. Chen said this case shows that the coronavirus could be a recurring problem. Chen said there are currently two camps of opinion regarding how COVID-19 will develop. One side believes it will be with mankind for a long time while another camp believes it will be like SARS and eventually disappear.
The government is preparing for a long-term battle with the coronavirus and for measures to deal with it if it becomes as common as the flu. Chen said this is a likely scenario but there are also many possibilities into how the pandemic could develop.
Chen also explained that the government is not planning to use mass testing as a way to screen for the coronavirus among people arriving in Taiwan. That’s because there would be many false negative and false positive results. He said the consequences of these false results would be difficult for Taiwan to handle.