About two out of every five children’s plastic watches sold in Taiwan contain an excessive amount of plasticizer that could pose a health risk, the Bureau of Standards, Metrology and Inspection’s (BSMI) latest investigation showed.
The bureau inspected 12 types of children’s watches sold at hypermarkets, toy stores and retail outlets across the country and found that five contained plasticizer at amounts exceeding the legal limits.
The bureau said product safety standards do not allow for plasticizer chemicals making up more than 0.1 percent of product mass, but the substandard plastic watches contained such chemicals in excess of this amount, with one Maxima brand watch containing 20.56 percent of plasticizers by mass.
Photo: CNA
The maker of the Maxima watch was also guilty of other product violations, including not having a proper product label indicating country of origin or the manufacturer’s name and address, and its product labels were not translated into Chinese.
A China-manufactured Casio watch also tested positive for plasticizer chemicals at 1.02 percent on its plastic watchstrap, despite costing NT$700.
BSMI deputy director-general Huang Lai-ho (黃來和) said watches that contain excessive amounts of plasticizers could be dangerous for children, who might put the plastic watchstraps in their mouth.
“Plasticizer chemicals could be absorbed through the skin when children wear the watch or enter the body if they put the watch in their mouths,” Huang said.
Plasticizers, or phthalate esters, contain environmental hormones that act as endocrine disruptors. The substances can potentially damage the liver and kidneys, cause men to develop female traits and increase the risk of breast cancer in women, the bureau said.
The bureau has ordered all substandard watches to be removed from store shelves and called for product improvements to be made, with fines of up to NT$200,000 for those who fail to comply.
It also urged parents to only buy watches that are properly labeled and teach children not to put plastic watches in their mouths.
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The next minimum wage hike is expected to exceed NT$30,000, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday during an award ceremony honoring “model workers,” including migrant workers, at the Presidential Office ahead of Workers’ Day today. Lai said he wished to thank the awardees on behalf of the nation and extend his most sincere respect for their hard work, on which Taiwan’s prosperity has been built. Lai specifically thanked 10 migrant workers selected for the award, saying that although they left their home countries to further their own goals, their efforts have benefited Taiwan as well. The nation’s industrial sector and small businesses lay
RSS