In order to better understand the complexities of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), the National Science Council (NSC) has launched a one-year research project it hopes will help fight the disease and lead to the development of vaccines.
The NT$ 38 million project -- to be carried out by nine leading groups from research centers and universities -- aims to clarify clinical symptoms, seek methods of diagnosis and treatment, develop fast detection technology and discover vaccines and medicines.
The project has been incorporated into the existing National Research Program for Genomic Medicine conducted by NSC.
"Everyday, scientists in many countries bring up new but uncertain information about newly discovered disease. For Taiwan, which is hard hit by SARS, it's extraordinarily important to study the infection that hits home," said Chen Ding-shinn (陳定信), dean of the medical college at National Taiwan University (NTU). The NTU is a co-convener of the project.
Scientists at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other laboratories have detected a previously unknown strain of coronavirus in patients with SARS.
This new coronavirus is the leading suspect in the search for the cause of SARS.
According to Chen Pei-jer (
Core facilities, Chen said, would be available at the hospital, where the first probable SARS patient was treated last month.
Currently, Chen said, scientists at the lab are still trying to cultivate the SARS virus.
"Working on SARS-related research is worthwhile. Animal viruses are always there. We need to know how humans can handle such viruses," said Sunney Chan (陳長謙) vice president of Academia Sinica, who is also a convener of the project.
Although Taiwan is not a member of the World Health Organization, Chan said, accessing up-to-date SARS research information through international connections remains possible.
Chan said that improved understanding about SARS through scientific research was key preventing people from becoming hysterical over the spread of the disease.
Council officials said that international cooperation on the development of a vaccine would be promoted in the future.
"We plan to spend NT$ 1.17 billion [out of the Cabinet's NT$50 billion budget for SARS control] developing a vaccine," said Wei Yau-huei (
Noting that numerous veteran researchers in Taiwan are shying away from working with the SARS virus, Wei urged young, ambitious scientists to make their contributions to SARS research.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
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Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching