Democratic Progressive Party Taipei City councilors yesterday lashed out at the Taipei City Government for installing vending machines that sell syringes and condoms in public restrooms near schools, urging the city government to remove them.
Vending machines selling condoms, needles, syringes and the drug substitute methadone have been installed in more than 30 public restrooms in Taipei City, some of which are near schools, making them easily accessible to students, Taipei City councilors Yen Sheng-kuan (顏聖冠) and Hung Chien-yi (洪健益) said.
The packages, which cost NT$20, come with instructions from Taipei City’s Health Department, the councilors told a press conference.
“It’s unacceptable that these dangerous needles and condoms can be easily obtained by students. This is a serious threat to the safety of our children and all Taipei residents,” Yen said.
Yen Muh-yong (顏慕庸), a division chief at the department, said installing the vending machines was part of the central government’s program to combat the spread of HIV.
Under the program, several hundred distribution points have been set up across the country to provide syringes and methadone, which is used by recovering drug addicts.
The goal is to ensure drug users have access to clean needles to prevent the spread of HIV and to offer anti-addictives used in quitting drug use, he said.
Department of Health data shows that about 80 percent of Taiwan’s HIV cases are related to drug use, he said.
Yen Muh-yong said the city government had set up the vending machines to help carry out the central government’s policy, but acknowledged that residents, and especially students, could be affected.
He said the department would remove the vending machines from seven public restrooms near schools and would place warning labels on the remaining machines to prevent confusion over their contents.
AGING: While Japan has 22 submarines, Taiwan only operates four, two of which were commissioned by the US in 1945 and 1946, and transferred to Taiwan in 1973 Taiwan would need at least 12 submarines to reach modern fleet capabilities, CSBC Corp, Taiwan chairman Chen Cheng-hung (陳政宏) said in an interview broadcast on Friday, citing a US assessment. CSBC is testing the nation’s first indigenous defense submarine, the Hai Kun (海鯤, Narwhal), which is scheduled to be delivered to the navy next month or in July. The Hai Kun has completed torpedo-firing tests and is scheduled to undergo overnight sea trials, Chen said on an SET TV military affairs program. Taiwan would require at least 12 submarines to establish a modern submarine force after assessing the nation’s operational environment and defense
A white king snake that frightened passengers and caused a stir on a Taipei MRT train on Friday evening has been claimed by its owner, who would be fined, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. A person on Threads posted that he thought he was lucky to find an empty row of seats on Friday after boarding a train on the Bannan (Blue) Line, only to spot a white snake with black stripes after sitting down. Startled, he jumped up, he wrote, describing the encounter as “terrifying.” “Taipei’s rat control plan: Release snakes on the metro,” one person wrote in reply, referring
The coast guard today said that it had disrupted "illegal" operations by a Chinese research ship in waters close to the nation and driven it away, part of what Taipei sees a provocative pattern of China's stepped up maritime activities. The coast guard said that it on Thursday last week detected the Chinese ship Tongji (同濟號), which was commissioned only last year, 29 nautical miles (54km) southeast of the southern tip of Taiwan, although just outside restricted waters. The ship was observed lowering ropes into the water, suspected to be the deployment of scientific instruments for "illegal" survey operations, and the coast
Taiwan’s two cases of hantavirus so far this year are on par with previous years’ case numbers, and the government is coordinating rat extermination work, so there should not be any outbreaks, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞) said today in an interview with the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper). An increase in rat sightings in Taipei and New Taipei City has raised concerns about the spread of hantavirus, as rats can carry the disease. In January, a man in his 70s who lived in Taipei’s Daan District (大安) tested positive posthumously for hantavirus, Taiwan’s
RSS