CONSTRUCTION
Taichung to build tower
The Greater Taichung Government is planning to build a skyscraper, to be called The Tower of Taiwan, in the Taichung Shuinan Airport Trade Park that it hopes will be a new and important landmark in central Taiwan. Taichung Deputy Mayor Hsiao Chia-chi (蕭家旗) said the first stage of an international design competition for the building had already begun and the results would be announced in September. At least five architecture or design companies will be selected in the initial stage, entitling them to prize money of US$50,000 and the chance to proceed to the second stage of the competition, after which a winner will be selected, Hsiao said.
CINEMA
Taiwanese films selected
Two Taiwanese film productions have been chosen for this year’s Paris Project as part of a film collaboration between Taipei and Paris, the Taipei Film Commission said earlier this week. Marry Go Round (非嫁不可) by director Cheng Fen-fen (鄭芬芬) and Afternoon Delight (下午茶) by director Arvin Chen (陳駿霖) were selected for the co-production platform to compete for investment with other projects from 30 countries. US-born Chen won the Network for the Promotion of Asian Cinema Award, a leading authority in Asian cinema, at the Berlin Film Festival last year with his first feature film Au Revoir Taipei (一頁台北). The Paris Project is part of the Paris Cinema International Film Festival, which will be held from July 2 to July 13 for the ninth year.
HEALTH
Subsidized therapy lauded
The Taiwan Lung Cancer Society applauded the government’s recent decision to subsidize targeted therapy for patients suffering from certain types of lung cancer yesterday. A press conference was held after the Bureau of National Health Insurance announced that pulmonary adenocarcinoma patients with EGFR gene mutations or metastasis would qualify for a subsidy for the cancer drug Gefitinib beginning this month. The Taiwan Lung Cancer Society said the move would benefit an estimated 2,500 patients a year. Perng Reury-perng (彭瑞鵬), a society member and a doctor at Taipei Veterans General Hospital, said that Gefitinib has proven more effective than chemotherapy in treating pulmonary adenocarcinoma, the most common type of lung cancer among Taiwanese. Without a government subsidy, the average patient has to pay about NT$1 million (US$31,250) a year for Gefitinib treatment.
CULTURE
Lee comments on actor son
Oscar-winning Taiwanese-American director Ang Lee (李安) described his son as “a serious actor” following his performance in the hit Hollywood movie The Hangover Part II, local media reported yesterday. Mason Lee (李淳) plays alongside Bradley Cooper in the sequel, which follows four men on an -alcohol-soaked odyssey through Bangkok, bagging nearly US$186 million in two weeks in the US, despite sometimes harsh reviews. “His performance is quite good, he is a very serious actor,” Ang Lee was quoted as telling reporters after watching the movie in Taipei. However, Lee said he had not thought about casting his son, local media quoted him as saying. Ang Lee is currently in Taiwan shooting his first 3D film Life of Pi about an Indian boy adrift on a lifeboat in the Pacific with a zebra, a hyena, an orangutan and a tiger. Lee was hailed as the “glory of Taiwan” after becoming the first Asian to win a best director Oscar for his gay cowboy drama Brokeback Mountain in 2007.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
REVENGE TRAVEL: A surge in ticket prices should ease this year, but inflation would likely keep tickets at a higher price than before the pandemic Scoot is to offer six additional flights between Singapore and Northeast Asia, with all routes transiting Taipei from April 1, as the budget airline continues to resume operations that were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, a Scoot official said on Thursday. Vice president of sales Lee Yong Sin (李榮新) said at a gathering with reporters in Taipei that the number of flights from Singapore to Japan and South Korea with a stop in Taiwan would increase from 15 to 21 each week. That change means the number of the Singapore-Taiwan-Tokyo flights per week would increase from seven to 12, while Singapore-Taiwan-Seoul
BAD NEIGHBORS: China took fourth place among countries spreading disinformation, with Hong Kong being used as a hub to spread propaganda, a V-Dem study found Taiwan has been rated as the country most affected by disinformation for the 11th consecutive year in a study by the global research project Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem). The nation continues to be a target of disinformation originating from China, and Hong Kong is increasingly being used as a base from which to disseminate that disinformation, the report said. After Taiwan, Latvia and Palestine ranked second and third respectively, while Nicaragua, North Korea, Venezuela and China, in that order, were the countries that spread the most disinformation, the report said. Each country listed in the report was given a score,
POOR PREPARATION: Cultures can form on food that is out of refrigeration for too long and cooking does not reliably neutralize their toxins, an epidemiologist said Medical professionals yesterday said that suspected food poisoning deaths revolving around a restaurant at Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 Store in Taipei could have been caused by one of several types of bacterium. Ho Mei-shang (何美鄉), an epidemiologist at Academia Sinica’s Institute of Biomedical Sciences, wrote on Facebook that the death of a 39-year-old customer of the restaurant suggests the toxin involved was either “highly potent or present in massive large quantities.” People who ate at the restaurant showed symptoms within hours of consuming the food, suggesting that the poisoning resulted from contamination by a toxin and not infection of the