After successfully keeping coronavirus at bay, Taiwan is currently in the grip of its first serious outbreak.
The island is desperately seeking vaccines to protect its people, and Taiwan’s giant neighbour China has offered to help.
But this puts Taiwanese leaders in a dilemma. Should they accept assistance from a country that wants to see Taiwan cease to exist as a self-governing entity?
Or, to put it another way, is the virus more important than politics?
So far, Taiwan has said no to Beijing.
The dilemma did not exist until the middle of this month. Up until then, Taiwan had seen only 1,500 or so infections and just 12 deaths.
But then cases began to increase sharply. On Thursday alone Taiwan reported 13 deaths.
And few people in Taiwan are protected against the virus.
Up until this week, Taiwan had received around only 700,000 vaccine doses. Just 1% of the population of 23 million had received a jab.
To fight the upsurge in cases, the authorities in Taiwan realised they needed more vaccines – and fast.
On Tuesday, Health Minister Chen Shih-chung said two million shots would arrive in June; 10 million by the end of August.
