By The Kansas City Star Editorial Board
China has agreed to allow Taiwan to attend this week’s meeting of the World Health Assembly in Geneva, a major concession by Beijing.
It was the latest news in the rapidly warming relationship between Taiwan and China, a trend that has significantly eased tensions in what was once one of the world’s more ominous flashpoints.
The two nations recently signed a spate of agreements aimed at encouraging closer ties, including direct flights and direct connections for cargo shipping.
Relations began improving steadily after the election last May of Taiwan’s new president, Ma Ying-jeou, who promised to set aside past conflicts.
Taiwan has long allowed its citizens to invest in China, but blocked Chinese investment in Taiwan out of fear of giving Beijing potential leverage in any future crisis. Now Taiwan has agreed in principal to allow such transactions, and a Chinese company recently announced plans for a $527 million investment in Taiwan’s third-largest phone company.
But the big prize for Taiwan was an invitation to attend the meeting of the ruling body of the World Health Organization. Taiwan will attend only as an observer, but this will ease some of its China-imposed diplomatic isolation. And it will allow Taiwan more timely coordination with other countries during any health emergency.
During the 2003 outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, 37 people died on Taiwan. World Health Organization representatives, however, failed to send representatives for more than a month after the first cases appeared.
With swine flu still spreading and future permutations of the virus possible, allowing Taiwan to participate in the international health organization is long overdue, but raises another question. Microbes don’t respect boundaries, so why shouldn’t Taiwan receive full membership status?
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Taiwan's WHO membership
I support Taiwan to become a full member of the World Health Organization (WHO). The Economist Intelligence Unit ranked Taiwan second worldwide in terms of health system performance, underscoring the island’s distinctive health accomplishments. Taiwan has demonstrated malaria-fighting results in São Tomé and Príncipe and has set up Taiwan Health Centers, respectively, in the Solomon Islands and the Marshall Islands to provide medical treatment and public health services. Taiwan is more than willing to help other countries solve various medical and health profession problems. Demonstrating its generosity and self-confidence, China can join the world in welcoming Taiwan to the WHO and other international organizations.