■ Health
More dengue fever reported
The Center for Disease Control yesterday reported the 15th case of domestically contracted dengue fever this year, raising alarm over the spread of the mosquito-borne disease. The latest case, a 57-year-old female in Pingtung City's Weihsin borough, has been hospitalized. According to health officials, the source of the infection has been identified as the same area as reported in previous cases on Aug. 12 and Aug. 16. However, officials said that this was a type of dengue fever different to that which was discovered in nearby Changan borough last month, which suggested that at least two sources of infection exist. The center said that a task force would be sent to collect blood samples from the 50 houses nearby.
■ Health
Beware of river water
The Center for Disease Control yesterday called
on the public to refrain
from swimming in rivers and streams and to boil water before drinking it, as viruses and bacteria thrive in
the conditions created
by Typhoon Aere. "The
water in flooded areas may
be polluted by overflows
from sewers, septic tanks or floating garbage. Dysentery, typhoid and tetanus are likely to emerge," said Shih Wen-yi (施文儀), the center's deputy director-general. According to the center, the number of infections caused by bacteria of the genus Leptospira increased threefold after Typhoon Nari hit in 2001. The bacteria are transmitted by contaminated water coming into contact with skin lacerations. The center
also urged people to wear waterproof boots and gloves when cleaning up slime and muck in their community, and to boil cooking utensils that have been immersed in water. Frozen food that thawed during power failures should be discarded to minimize the risk of gastrointestinal illness, the center said.
■ Constitution
Key bill promulgated
Legislative Speaker Wang
Jin-pyng (王金平) yesterday posted the promulgation document of the newly-passed constitutional amendment bill at the Legislative Yuan. According
to Article 1 of the Additional Articles to the Constitution, the promulgation period
will be six months, ending on
Feb. 26 next year. Article 1
also stipulates that mission-oriented National Assembly representatives should be elected to ratify the bill within three months of the end of the promulgation period. After the representatives have been elected and confirmed, they have to convene within 10 days. The representative meeting can last up to one month. Consequently, it is estimated that the National Assembly representatives will ratify the bill in July next year at the latest.
■ Education
Foreign students on the way
Twenty-four Paraguayan students who were awarded scholarships to study
in Taiwan left home
on Wednesday. The scholarships have been
set up under a program established by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Education to invite select students from around the world to study in Taiwan. Several Paraguayan scholarship recipients have already completed their Chinese language courses
in Taiwan and will study
at three different national universities from next semester. Paraguay is Taiwan's only diplomatic
ally in South America. The Taiwan scholarship program offers each recipient a round-trip plane ticket and NT$30,000 (US$882) per month for a five-year term -- one year for language courses and four years for study at a university.
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
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
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater