TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan is ranked first in the latest Nikkei Asia COVID-19 Recovery Index, an improvement of two spots from its ranking in January.
On Friday (Feb. 4), Nikkei Asia placed Taiwan at the top of its COVID-19 Recovery Index, with a score of 82 out of 100. The index ranks 120 countries/regions based on their control of infections, vaccination rate, and social mobility.
According to Nikkei, the higher the ranking on the index, the closer a country is to "recovery," which it defines as "low numbers of COVID-19 cases, better inoculation rates, and stringent social distancing measures." The data is derived from Our World in Data, Google COVID-19 Community Mobility Reports, Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker, and Nikkei Asia Research.
Nikkei pointed out that although Taiwan took the top spot, six points were deducted for a drop in air traffic, with January international arrivals 80% lower than pre-pandemic levels. Nevertheless, this was an improvement from its third-place ranking in January when the newspaper noted Taiwan's "zero COVID" policy.
The newspaper highlighted Cambodia's meteoric rise to second place from 22nd in December. It praised the Southeast Asian country for its declaration that it would live with the virus, having reached a vaccination rate of 98.5% among adults and 96.8% among children aged five or older.
On the other hand, the Philippines fell 45 spots to 104th amid an explosion of Omicron cases. The paper observed that the Philippines has only vaccinated 53% of its population, while less than 7% have received a booster shot by the end of January.
As for China, Nikkei stated that the communist country will face new challenges to its zero COVID strategy amid outbreaks across multiple provinces and the emergence of the Omicron variant. An influx of athletes and visitors from across the globe for the Winter Olympics is also posing a challenge to Beijing's attempts to contain the virus.
