■ SOCIETY
American commits suicide
Chiayi City police yesterday ruled out homicide as the cause of death of a 67-year-old US national, concluding that the man had hanged himself at his home a day earlier. The man, identified as Terry Edward Gibbs, was found dead at his home by his girlfriend on Sunday afternoon. Police said his body was discovered hanging by a rope tied to a stair handrail in the living room. Police determined that Gibbs had been suffering from chronic heart and kidney disease and had recently been diagnosed with pneumonia. Edward's deteriorating health led him to commit suicide, the police report said.
■ SEISMIC ACTIVITY
Earthquake rocks Taiwan
An earthquake measuring 6 on the Richter scale rattled the nation at 9:40pm last night. The Central Weather Bureau said the epicenter of the quake was located to the east of the bureau's seismological station in Hsilin (西林), Hualien, at a depth of 29.6km. The earthquake measured 4 in Hualien, 2 in Taipei, 2 in Taichung and 1 in Tainan. As of press time, no significant damage or casualties had been reported. This was the second significant earthquake to hit Taiwan this year. The first, a 6.2, took place on Jan. 25 and was centered east of Taitung County's Chenggong Township (成功).
■ LITERATURE
Ex-president releases book
Former Bulgarian president Zhelyu Zhelev will release a Chinese-language edition of his book Fascism tomorrow in Taipei. In a press conference to be held at the Taipei International Shangri-La Hotel to introduce the book, Zhelev will also give a speech comparing fascism and communism. Invitated by the Taiwan Democracy Foundation, Zhelev arrived in Taipei yesterday on a five-day visit. During his stay, he will meet President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平), president of the foundation.
■ HEALTH
Dengue cases on the rise
Eleven cases of imported dengue fever have been reported in Taipei this year, a city official said yesterday. Lin Pi-fen (林碧芬), of the Taipei City Government's Bureau of Health, said all the cases originated in Southeast Asian countries and warned that there has been an increase in dengue fever outbreaks over the past few years, which she attributed to global warming. In Vietnam, 29,000 dengue fever cases have been reported since the beginning of the year, with 21,000 cases and 17 deaths in Thailand, Lin said. Both outbreaks registered a year-on-year growth of 30 percent, Lin said. In Taiwan, the number of indigenous dengue fever cases this year is at 60, with 53 reported in Tainan City, five in Tainan County and two in Kaohsiung City. The total number is much higher than the 28 cases in the same period last year, Lin said, adding that no indigenous cases have been reported in Taipei City this year.
■ DEFENSE
Kinmen troops cut further
Taiwan will further reduce the number of troops guarding Kinmen as a way to ease tensions in the Taiwan Strait, Defense Minister Lee Tien-yu (李天羽) said yesterday. He said the Ministry of National Defense had made an assessment of the situation between Taiwan and China before deciding to trim the force stationed on Kinmen. He declined to elaborate. There are currently fewer than 10,000 troops on Kinmen.
FLU SEASON: Twenty-six severe cases were reported from Tuesday last week to Monday, including a seven-year-old girl diagnosed with influenza-associated encephalopathy Nearly 140,000 people sought medical assistance for diarrhea last week, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said on Tuesday. From April 7 to Saturday last week, 139,848 people sought medical help for diarrhea-related illness, a 15.7 percent increase from last week’s 120,868 reports, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The number of people who reported diarrhea-related illness last week was the fourth highest in the same time period over the past decade, Lee said. Over the past four weeks, 203 mass illness cases had been reported, nearly four times higher than the 54 cases documented in the same period
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:
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
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