username

As others have mentioned on Effective 00:00 19 Mar - No Foreign Passport Holders Allowed into Taiwan (ARC OK), no transit passengers effective 00:00 24 MAR through 24 JUN 23:59. Restriction continues indefinitely for Mainland China flights (MFM/HKG are OK).

There was no detail on nationality so I suppose this applies to everyone, even Republic of China (Taiwan) passport holders. It is also not clear whether this is boarding time or arrival/transit time.

https://www.evaair.com/en-tw/about-e...nsit-news.html

davewang202

Anyone know if this policy will/may end after April 7? Without transit via TPE as an option, it's really hard to find a flight out of China around mid-April.

username

I don't think anyone knows. The only one who has set deadlines for Covid-19 so far is Donald Trump.

gengar

I certainly wouldn't count on it. Many of the recent policy changes have come with well under 48 hours advance notice, and with Taiwan diplomatic channels unprepared for them.

s0ssos

Isn't the way it is technically set that it expires Apr 7? So unless they do something to extend it, it isn't valid after Apr 7

s0ssos

I think it is pretty hard to fly anywhere in Asia without TPE, given no SIN/HKG transit (which doesn't seem to have an expiration date)

gengar

As I stated, the advance notice on this policy and many others concerning travel bans/quarantines was less than 48 hours. They may very well extend the policy in a similar fashion.

sfo3388

Travel bans and quarantines could come in short notice. Lifting such will take weeks, in my opinion. This is pandemic. No country is safe at this moment. I doubt HKG/SIN/TPE would be open to transit passengers in two weeks.

gengar

I could see certain quarantines/bans in certain areas being lifted early, depending on the situation and circumstances. The point is that it's unpredictable.

davewang202

Thanks folks. I realize that I was grasping a bit at straws, and I realize that these rules/regulations are coming hard and fast not because of a basis in statistics or a policy decision, but just based on the (often real) fear of the unknown, and the facts and statistics are changing day-by-day all over the world. What I think might be helpful is if someone has been watching enough news from Taiwan to get a mindset of the policy makers that would specifically impact this rule/policy. E.g. If the Minister of health says that they're implementing new testing/screening regiment for transit passengers along with a testing surcharge, and they're watching NRT to see what the risk factors are for allowing transit PAX to return. I think snippets of such news would be very useful if anyone has seen such news from Taiwan.

Davvidd

Yes but I feel it's not realistic to lift the ban on flying by the 7th of April. The situation is not under control in many countries so hopefully Eva will make up their mind and cancel or suspend the flights for at least 2 months or more.

username

if you understand Mandarin, you can watch the news conference - every day at 2 PM Taipei Time, sometimes delayed if the new cases are large. It is live-streamed and recorded by multiple media outlets. On Youtube, look for 疫情指揮中心 最新防疫說明

I personally do not see them relaxing the rules any time soon until the numbers come down: https://infogram.com/--1h8j4xgy7x1d6mv

Davvidd

I hope that they will extend to a reasonable time frame so we all can either cancel the flights or make alternate arrangements.

bearchemist

Compared to US and Europe, people in Taiwan are very concerned about Covid-19. It's absurd watching some (most) news as if the world is coming to the end, even though situation in other countries and continents are much more dire. So the answer is no, do not count on Taiwan relaxing the restriction before May.

ProleOnParole

It seems Taiwan is mostly testing people arriving from abroad, which means new cases are mostly discovered among recent arrivals from abroad, and that in turn gives the impression that shutting down the border is more beneficial than it might be in reality. But given the circumstances, I guess nobody can blame them for playing it safe.

Taiwan's largest trade show, Computex, normally taking place in June, was rescheduled to the end of September last week. I think this gives some insight into how long the restrictions were expected to last at the time but the situation is changing dynamically of course.