TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan's Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) on Thursday (Feb. 16) announced that it will likely end the home quarantine requirement for mild COVID cases and instead implement a '0+n' scheme.

As the COVID outbreak in Taiwan continues to wane with cases dropping for 13 consecutive days, CECC head Victor Wang (王必勝) stated that the center's press conferences will be reduced from twice a week to once a week. The 16,477 local COVID cases reported that day represented a 20% decline from the same day last week.

Wang said that the easing of the indoor mask mandate is still on track to begin on Feb. 20. When asked by the media when the CECC will change the status of COVID to a Category 4 communicable disease, Wang said that this will be the last measure implemented.

The CECC head emphasized that the main priority is to deal with the adjustment of the quarantine method for COVID cases and revise the definition for COVID cases. Wang said that the CECC will likely eliminate the need for mild COVID cases to undergo home quarantine in March.

The center is looking at reducing quarantine for mild cases from "5+n" to "0+n." Under this system, there would be zero days of quarantine and up to seven days of self-health monitoring, depending on how soon a patient tests negative.