Daily Times

Taiwan announced to impose new COVID-19 restrictions after its 253-day streak of being safe from coronavirus ended on Tuesday, as the first locally transmitted case was reported. The country will roll back foreign flights and tighten quarantine requirements for crew members after a cargo pilot tested positive for coronavirus. The pilot, who flew routes abroad, was said to have been coughing during his last flight but did not wear a mask at all times.

Taking precautionary measures to avoid spread of the new strain of covid found in the UK, Taiwanese officials said Tuesday they would cut passenger flights from London by half beginning Wednesday.

Taiwan’s EVA Airways Corp sacked a New Zealand pilot on Wednesday whom the government has blamed for the island’s first locally transmit

Taiwan has kept the pandemic well under control thanks to early and effective prevention methods and widespread use of masks, with all new cases for more than the last 250 days being among travellers arriving on the island.

But the government was jolted by Tuesday’s announcement of the domestic infection of a woman who is a friend of a New Zealand pilot confirmed to have been infected earlier this week having flown routes to the United States.

The case has ignited public anger, with one Taiwan television station calling the pilot a “public enemy”, after the government said he had not reported all his contacts and the places he had been, nor worn a face mask in the cockpit when he should have.