Taiwan reports 4th-lowest COVID deaths in world, will not follow China

台灣傳出COVID死亡率在世界上排名第四低，不會跟隨中國

Taiwan also reports 3rd-lowest excess deaths, 6th-lowest COVID fatality rate in world


TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) on Tuesday (Oct. 11) announced that Taiwan has the fourth-lowest death rate from COVID per million in the world, third-lowest excess mortality rate, and sixth-lowest COVID fatality rate.

During a press conference, CECC head Victor Wang (王必勝) announced that Taiwan's COVID case fatality risk is the sixth-lowest among Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries at 0.17%.

The country with the lowest COVID case fatality risk is Singapore at 0.08%, followed by Iceland at 0.1%, South Korea at 0.11%, New Zealand at 0.12%, and Australia at 0.15%. Japan came in seventh at 0.21%, Germany in eighth at 0.43%, Hong Kong in ninth at 0.57%, and Italy in 10th at 0.78%. The U.S. came in 13th with a COVID fatality risk of 1.13%.

In terms of the cumulative confirmed COVID mortality rate, Taiwan ranked fourth at 490.8 deaths per million. The country with the lowest cumulative COVID death rate is Singapore at 269.8, followed by Japan at 361.1 and New Zealand at 424.2.

South Korea came in fifth at 559.6, Australia was sixth at 609.4, Iceland was seventh at 633.9, Hong Kong was eighth at 1,380.3, Germany was ninth at 1,848.1, and France was 10th at 2,366.7, rounding out the top 10. The U.S. ranked 13th at 3,290.2 deaths per million.

Wang then pointed out that Taiwan has the third-lowest excess mortality rate per 100,000 people in the world since the country's first 50 COVID deaths with 40 excess deaths. The WHO defines excess mortality as "the mortality above what would be expected based on the non-crisis mortality rate in the population of interest."

New Zealand had the lowest number of excess deaths per 100,000 since its first 50 COVID deaths at 11. Liechtenstein came in second at 5.

Mongolia tied Taiwan for third at 40 excess deaths, Australia and Qatar tied for fourth at 43, Luxembourg came in fifth at 49, Singapore ranked sixth at 51, and Japan and Iceland tied for seventh at 62.

Regarding calls by scholars to "co-exist with low numbers of cases," Wang said he does not know whether this requires the zero-COVID policy or city lockdowns seen in China, but said he is sure that "We will not go back to that old road." He said that what he is sure of is that the CECC will not reprise bans on indoor dining, suspend work or classes, control the flow of people, or impose restrictions on the borders.

"These were all done in the past era of zero-COVID," said Wang. He said that since April, Taiwan has entered a phase of co-existing with the virus, and "we have steadily opened up step by step."

He said that the purpose is to restore society to a normal way of life and promote economic development. The CECC head expressed his belief that Taiwan has achieved "very good results" in epidemic prevention, which were "achieved by all of the people."