■ HEALTH
Alarms urged for eateries
The Consumer's Foundation yesterday urged hotpot and barbecue restaurants to install carbon monoxide detector alarms and good ventilation systems, adding that the establishments should check their natural gas equipment and pipelines for safety compliance at least every two years. Following an incident on Friday when 26 people in Taoyuan were poisoned by carbon monoxide at a hotpot eatery, the foundation randomly surveyed a barbecue and hotpot restaurant in Taipei and found that just with the barbecue fire ignited, the carbon monoxide density near the stovetop was 1291 ppm. The Bureau of Standards, Metrology and Inspection said exposure to carbon monoxide with a density of over 1,200ppm could cause an increased heart rate and arrhythmia. A density of over 2,000ppm would cause unconsciousness or death and a density of over 5,000ppm would kill a person in a matter of a few minutes, the bureau said.
■ TRAVEL
Government issues warnings
The Bureau of Consular Affairs yesterday advised the public to avoid traveling to South Africa on their own because of the worsening public disorder. The bureau issued the warning on its official Web site following a recent incident in which two Taiwanese backpackers were robbed in downtown Johannesburg. The bureau also advised people who join a package tour to South Africa to follow their groups closely and avoid going anywhere alone while in Johannesburg. The bureau also urged the public to postpone any plans to travel to East Timor. If such a trip cannot be avoided travelers should keep track of the latest developments in the country and refrain from taking part in any public assemblies or going to any dangerous areas while in the country, the bureau said.
■ CRIME
Taiwanese in Illinois safe
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday confirmed that none of the 30 Taiwanese students and 10 Taiwanese professors at Northern Illinois University were injured in the shooting on Thursday when a student fatally shot five people before turning the gun on himself. Ministry spokeswoman Phoebe Yeh (葉非比) said the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in Chicago contacted the school's Taiwanese Students Association immediately after receiving news of the incident. The vice-president of the association confirmed that all of the Taiwanese students and professors were unharmed.
■ CHARITY
Celebrity items auctioned
With auction items donated by entertainment celebrities, an online charity auction organized by the Chinatrust Charity Foundation will begin at 10am tomorrow to raise funds for disadvantaged children. Among the 40 items donated by 17 celebrities for auction are 15 autographed limited edition posters and calligraphy from Aska Yang (楊宗緯), a costume from the movie The Most Distant Course donated by actress Guey Lun-mei (桂綸鎂) and a red dress that popular singer Elva Hsiao (蕭亞軒) wore in a music video. The auction will continue for four days, ending at 12pm on Friday. The funds raised through the auction will be allocated to the Taiwan Fund for Children and Families, the Syinlu Welfare Foundation and the Noordhoff Craniofacial Foundation to help children in need. More information can be found on the event's Web site at www.bizdev-chinatrustorg.dc.com.tw/auction.
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