On June 1, 2015, the Taiwan Centers for Disease Control (Taiwan CDC) announced that someone has intentionally fabricated and spread a piece of fake news in Chinese through social media. The false Chinese message read: “大家出門戴口罩，剛長庚已通報一例MERS 中東呼吸症候群 冠狀病毒（無藥物可治，致死率高達4成），34歲住內湖檢體明天中午有消息，新聞還沒有，醫生朋友的內線，大家出公共場所小心防護。”, which literally translates to “Everyone must wear a face mask when out and about. Chang Gung Memorial Hospital has just reported a suspected MERS-CoV case. There is currently no known medication to treat MERS-CoV infection and the fatality rate is as high as 40%. The suspected case is 34 years old and resides in Neihu. The test result is expected to come out noon tomorrow. The newspaper and news media have not reported it because this is an insider information from a physician. Everyone should take precautions when visiting public places in order to ward off infection”.

In response, Taiwan CDC firmly states that spreading such inaccurate rumor is in violation of Article 9 of the Communicable Disease Control Act, which states that “When announcements regarding communicable diseases released by medical institutions, academic or research institutes and their employees, or reports on epidemic conditions made by mass media are erroneous or not in accord with the facts, corrections must be made immediately upon notification for correction by the competent authorities”, and the competent authorities may fine any person making such a false statement NT$ 90,000 up to NT$ 450,000 according to Article 64 of the Act.

Moreover, Taiwan CDC adds that the agency has always committed to open communication and information transparency when it comes to the ongoing MERS-CoV outbreaks and always announces the relevant information first-hand on its website for public reference.