Taiwan will more than double the number of people who have to quarantine at home to more than 5,000 as it seeks to contain a rare domestic cluster of Covid-19 connected to a hospital, the health minister said.

While the number of 15 people infected so far at the hospital in the northern city of Taoyuan is small compared to many other parts of the world, it has unnerved the government, which has cancelled many large-scale events related to the upcoming Lunar New Year.

Health Minister Chen Shih-chung told reporters that they will expand the number of people who have to quarantine at home for 14 days to those who may have had contact with the infected patients from the hospital cluster.