A team of experts from the US Centers for Disease Control has arrived in the southern Taiwanese city of Tainan for an international conference on diagnosing MERS.
Health officials from Taiwan and nine other Asia-Pacific countries are in attendance. The conference, which opened Wednesday, aims to raise the level of laboratory diagnostics in Asia-Pacific countries up to standards set by the WHO in 2005.
The spread of MERS from its point of origin in the Middle East to South Korea earlier in the year highlights the region’s vulnerability to the disease.
The three-day conference is the latest development in a year of close cooperation between US and Taiwanese health authorities.
Health experts from both countries met in Tainan during March to discuss medical training needed to counter the outbreak of Ebola in West Africa. In June, Taiwan and the US signed a memorandum of understanding that includes provisions for expanding cooperation in the area of international health.