CHARITY
Tzu Chi to use satellite data
The Buddhist Compassion Relief Tzu Chi Foundation, which is very active in overseas disaster relief work, signed an agreement on Thursday with the National Space Organization (NSPO) that will allow it free use of NSPO satellite images of disaster areas. Tzu Chi said it is often difficult to get a clear understanding of the way an area has been hit by a natural disaster at the ground level, which makes the overviews provided by satellite imagery vital in coordinating and executing relief operations. In the event of a natural disaster, “we will provide real-time images to Tzu Chi to help it carry out its relief work with maximum efficiency,” NSPO Director Chang Guey-shin (張桂祥) said.
PUBLIC SAFETY
‘Disaster maps’ planned
The government will chart “disaster prevention maps” for about 60 remote and disaster-prone villages nationwide to help residents evacuate in the case of disaster, the newly inaugurated head of the Public Construction Commission said yesterday. Commission Minister Lee Hong-yuan (李鴻源) said that past experience has shown that the 60-odd villages could become totally isolated for three days if a severe disaster struck, as assistance and rescue efforts would be hampered by inaccessible mountain roads and trails. The maps will provide guidance to residents of these villages on how to evacuate to safer areas and how to survive on their own for up to three days until rescuers can reach them. Lee said it would take six weeks to complete each map and priority would be given to areas considered most vulnerable to disasters.
PUBLIC SAFETY
Bureau warns against fires
The Forestry Bureau yesterday reminded the public ahead of the four-day Tomb Sweeping Festival long weekend to take precautions while burning ghost money to avoid causing forest fires. Since most graves and ancestral burial grounds are located in remote, mountainous areas, the bureau said carelessness in dealing with fire and flammable materials, especially during the dry season, can easily lead to forest fires. Citing Pingtung County as an example, bureau officials said that two out of the four forest fires reported last year were caused by activities related to the festival. Besides burning ghost money, throwing lit cigarette butts can also start wildfires that could cause significant damage to the ecosystem, the official said.
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