The Truth Behind Not Implementing Widespread Screening: Reagents Delayed by Ossified Bureaucracy

 The Truth Behind Not Implementing Widespread Screening: Reagents Delayed by Ossified Bureaucracy

United Daily News Editorial (Taipei, Taiwan)

April 23, 2020

 Translation of an Excerpt

Cluster infections erupted on a naval flotilla on a training and goodwill mission, while the source of the infection still remains a mystery, but several of the infected were tested with antibodies; it is presumed that they probably had been infected earlier and recovered. This incident has once again exposed loopholes in Taiwan’s pandemic controls in a number of places; experts and local chiefs had recommended many times that the central government conduct full-scale, widespread screenings, but they were deemed to be "countering Chen Shih-chung", even being attacked by netizens. The Central Epidemic Command Center recently stated candidly that local quick screening reagents were still at the "testing stage"; outside circles thus suddenly became aware why Chen Shih-chung had earlier refused to conduct comprehensive screening. The unspeakable predicament was the inadequate capacity of screening. The progress of Taiwan's quick screening reagents was so slow, in fact, it was not because the technology could not catch up, but the ossified and conservative bureaucracy entangled its steps.

Taiwan’s biotech capacity is ample, and the National Development Fund has also injected large amounts of funds to foster the biotech industry. Why is it that at a crucial moment, we nevertheless only have a low-tech "face masks national team", while the "reagent national team", however, we only have heard footsteps on the staircase, without even a single local test reagent on the market so far? In fact, teams for researching and developing quick screening and medications injected by this country’s research institutes and biotech industry operators are many, and also have been showing their achievements, yet being constricted by laws and regulations that require verification of efficacy through long-term clinical trials, have delayed completing the last mile for marketing. The government has been obsessed in controlling face masks, not caring about the great leaps in epidemic control and biotechnology. How in the world could this be called "advance deployment"?

Doesn’t Su Tseng-chang always pride himself on being "the government that delivers"? Looking at the test reagent national team being delayed by an ossified bureaucracy, where is the can-do spirit?

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