■ EMPLOYMENT
CLA launches new program
The Council of Labor Affairs (CLA) yesterday announced the launch of a program to subsidize businesses providing training to the unemployed and graduates in an effort to encourage private enterprises to hire and train workers. Council of Labor Affairs Minister Jennifer Wang (王如玄) said the plan was designed to address three main problems: The inability of new graduates to match what they have learned in school to potential job opportunities, large numbers of unappealing job openings such as those offering low salaries or unsatisfactory working environments and companies looking to expand quickly because of rising demand. Businesses can submit an application to the council to propose a training program. Once approved, each trainee will receive NT$17,280 per month, of which up to NT$12,000 will be subsidized by the government and the rest paid by the company. To participate, businesses must agree to hire at least 90 percent of trainees as regular employees by the end of the training.
■HEALTH
CDC to test travel health plan
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) will test a self-management health plan at two international airports to help prevent travelers from bringing diseases into the country amid an increase of dengue fever cases. Dengue fever cases in Taiwan are mostly spread by travelers who become infected overseas and then import the disease, the CDC said. As of Aug. 30, there have been 379 reported import cases of dengue fever, dysentery and other infections this year. Countries such as Indonesia, Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand are the most common places for Taiwanese to contract the illnesses, the CDC said. The CDC will begin giving out disease control packages at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport and Kaohsiung International Airport starting on Sept. 15. The packages contain masks and disease information brochures for travelers returning from Southeast Asia and other high-risk areas, CDC Deputy Director-General Chou Jih-haw (周志浩) said yesterday. Chou urged people who suspect they have symptoms of contagious diseases after traveling to wear masks and inform doctors of their travel history. He also warned those who plan to go abroad to check the CDC’s Web site.
■ HEALTH
Pesticides found in tea
Three out of 36 tea products tested in Taipei contained excessive pesticide residue, the Taipei City government’s latest food safety checks showed yesterday. The products were all found to have excessive amounts of residue of pesticides including fenpropathrin, imidacloprid, methomyl and fipronil. The city has pulled the products off shelves and launched an investigation, health officials said. A specialist at the city’s health department said pesticide residue in tea can cause nausea and vomiting and increase the risk of liver problems.
■ TAIPEI FLORA EXPO
Folk god goes Gaga
A show featuring techno dance moves by a folk god figure was presented at the Los Angeles Dodgers Stadium on Saturday as part of a promotion for the Taipei International Flora Expo scheduled to open on Nov. 6. The central act was a figure depicting folk god Santaitz, or “Third Prince,” performing pop star Lady Gaga’s trademark dance moves to electronic music. The show was the opening entertainment act at a game between the Dodgers and the San Francisco Giants and a part of the Dodgers’ Taiwan Day promotion. The techno Santaitz also threw the first pitch to open the game.
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