■ Healthe
Dengue fever cases climb
The Center for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday warned the public to guard against dengue fever as the number of Taiwan dengue fever cases reached 76. As of yesterday, local dengue fever cases had risen to 17 and imported dengue fever cases had hit 59, the CDC said. "Imported cases are Taiwanese who were infected while travelling in Southeast Asian countries," the CDC said in a statement. The CDC disinfected the homes and surroundings of the 76 dengue fever victims, and urged people to clean up their neighborhoods to prevent mosquitos from breeding. Dengue fever, characterized by severe joint pains and a rash, is endemic in more than 100 countries and has become a major international health concern. Hemorrhagic dengue fever causes internal breeding and can be fatal.
■ Employment
Job opportunities increase
There were an average 1.8 work opportunities for each job seeker in the first seven months of this year, up from 1.5 job opportunities a year earlier, according to government statistics. The tallies made public by the Cabinet-level Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics show that companies registered more than 507,000 job vacancies with government-run employment service bodies in the January-July period, up 29.5 percent over the previous year's figure. Meanwhile, some 282,000 job seekers sought work through those public job broker organizations, up by 9.6 percent over the year-earlier level. In addition, government agencies issued some 78,000 professional certificates to qualified candidates during the first seven months of this year, an increase of nearly 40 percent from the same period last year.
■ Obituaries
ICRT's David Wang dies
International Community Radio Taipei (ICRT) disk jockey David Wang (王再得) died of liver cancer yesterday morning at the age of 39. Wang went to the National Taiwan University Hospital on Friday night because of stomach problems and doctors asked him to stay for the night for more detailed examination. At 1:40am his tumors broke up and he died due to sudden blood pressure changes. According to Hsu Chin-chuan (許金川), Wang's doctor, Wang has been a hepatitis B carrier for 20 years and had surgery last year. However, he discovered that the cancer came back approximately six months ago, but he refused to have more surgery. Wang joined ICRT as an intern in 1987. He rejoined the station as a part-time disc jockey after he returned from his military service in 1990.
■ Postal service
Chunghwa offers discounts
To celebrate its twentieth anniversary for domestic express mail, the Chunghwa Post Co Ltd. is offering a discount for express delivery services from tomorrow through Oct. 31. To mail a package lighter than 150 grams within a county or city will now cost NT$60 dollars. The company will also offer a 20 percent discount on priority packages in cold storage. As a reward for its customers, the company will give a memorial envelope to each client who uses express mail services. From Oct. 10 through Oct. 12, Chunghwa will set up makeshift offices in Taipei, Taichung, and Kaohsiung, where three new stamps commemorating the company's twentieth anniversary will be available for collectors.
■ Contradband
Crackdown results revealed
Government authorities seized more than 260,000 liters of bootlegged alcohol and over 11 million packs of smuggled cigarettes in the first half of this year. The tallies were released during a two-day government meeting on wiping out bootlegged alcohol and cigarettes which ended Friday. Illegally-made domestic rice wine, smuggled liquor from China, and bootlegged wine of famous foreign brands made up the bulk of the alcohol seized, while cigarettes of top foreign brands accounted for the bulk of the seized contraband tobacco. To curb bootlegged wine and cigarettes, relevant government agencies are considering stepping up crackdowns and assisting local farmers in setting up licensed factories.
■ People-smuggling
21 Chinese captured
Twenty-one Chinese women, including nine minors, were nabbed aboard a Taiwan fishing ship in waters off northern Taiwan early yesterday, coast guard officials reported. This was the largest bust on the water since the government kicked off its "snake-hunting" campaign Nov. 1, 2003, to crack down on rings involved in smuggling Chinese into Taiwan. Tipped off about one week ago that a smuggling ring was trying to ship a group of Chinese women to Taiwan for prostitution, the coast guard stepped up its patrols in the waters off northern Taiwan. At 1:25am, a coast guard cutter spotted the suspicious vessel -- a Keelung-registered fishing boat -- sailing about 8.6 nautical miles off Houchu, Tamsui. Coast guard officials found the 21 mainland Chinese women when they boarded the vessel for inspection.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods