So Quacking Exaggerated

The economic affairs ministry plumped for a goose when it announced that rumors of disposable paper meal boxes running out were “so quacking exaggerated”.

The message deployed a homophone where the word for the noise a goose makes sounds similar to the first character for the word “exaggerated” in Mandarin.

The approach contrasts with the Chinese mainland where authorities have tapped their well-oiled propaganda powers to wage a “people’s war” against a virus that has killed nearly 1,800 people.

State media has heralded the importance of patriotism to tackle the outbreak in a campaign reminiscent of Mao Zedong’s cries to mobilize the masses.

“To visit each other is to kill each other,” read one slogan in a quarantined district in Hubei province, the epicenter of the outbreak. “To get together is to commit suicide.”

Despite its cultural links and close proximity to China, Taiwan moved swiftly against the outbreak, quickly restricting and then banning arrivals from the mainland.

The island — which Beijing views as its own territory and keeps frozen out of the World Health Organization — recorded its first death on Sunday but has kept confirmed infections to just 20.