■ POLITICS
‘Clean’ committee formed
The Presidential Office formed a “clean government” committee on Monday, whose first job will be to bar Presidential Office employees from accepting or giving gifts during the Lunar New Year holidays. The committee has begun promoting the idea of “no offer of gifts,” “no acceptance of gifts” and “no acceptance of free meals,” although gifts and meals are acceptable if they meet certain regulations. The Presidential Office said the committee was created in response to President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) pledge to “correct the political atmosphere,” adding it was an important task of the government to set a new example of clean politics. The committee will meet once a month and will be chaired by Presidential Office Secretary-General Chan Chun-po (詹春柏).
■ TOURISM
‘CIP to provide subsidies
The Council of Indigenous Peoples (CIP) will select eight indigenous communities and provide them with up to NT$5 million (US$151,500) in subsidies to develop into tourism and leisure centers, a council official said yesterday. Alang Manglavan, director of the Department of Health and Welfare, said the program also hopes to help indigenous communities nurture management talent and increase employment. The council will decide late next month or early February which communities will receive the subsidies, he said. At talks yesterday with representatives of indigenous communities from Chiayi, Kaohsiung and Pingtung cities and counties, the council official invited communities with at least three years’ experience in community development to apply to join the program.
■ EDUCATION
‘AIT seeks study applicants
The American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) has begun accepting applications for seven Study of the United States Institutes next summer. The topics include American civilization, American politics and political thought, contemporary American literature, foreign policy, journalism and media, religious pluralism in the US and an institute for secondary educators. The programs will be held from mid-June through early August in the US and are designed for faculty and school educators. The institutes are postgraduate-level academic seminars with integrated study tours that will provide a group of 18 educators and professionals from around the world with the opportunity to learn more about US society, culture and institutions, AIT said. All participant costs will be covered. Information on the selection criteria, program summaries and application forms can be found at www.ait.org.tw. The deadline is Jan. 22.
■ EARTHQUAKES
‘Temblor shakes south
A moderate earthquake struck Kaohsiung County at 8:04am yesterday. The Central Weather Bureau said the 5.6 magnitude quake struck about 45km southeast of Tainan City. The US Geological Survey put the quake’s strength at 5.4. No casualties or damage were reported.
■ TRANSPORTATION
‘Rail travel disrupted
An insulator failure tripped a power line between Cidu (七堵) and Sijhih (汐止) railway stations at 6:47pm on Monday, causing delays to 44 trains and affecting about 35,000 people, Taiwan Railway Administration officials said. Passengers on express trains that were canceled or delayed by 60 minutes or more are eligible to claim full refunds within 15 days. The westward line resumed operations at 8:30pm and the eastward line restarted at 10:20pm, they said.
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:
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