HEALTH
Banned drugs found in fish
Health inspectors have detected traces of the banned drugs malachite green (MG) and leuco-malachite green (LMG) in four samples of farmed threadfin sold at local markets, the Food and Drug Administration said in a statement yesterday. The discovery was made during inspections of fish sold at markets nationwide in May, the statement said. A total of 37 samples were taken from threadfin, tilapia, milkfish and eels in markets in Taichung City, Chiayi County and Keelung City, the statement said, adding that apart from the four tainted threadfin samples, another 33 were determined not to contain banned or toxic residues. Official from the administration’s Central Center for Regional Administration said that under existing regulations, no MG or LMG residue should be detected in fish.
ENVIRONMENT
Less PET bottles found
There was a significant decrease in the number of polyethylene teraphthalate (PET) bottles collected in a nationwide beach cleanup campaign this year compared with last year, an Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) official said yesterday. In an EPA-led cleanup of 300km of beaches between April 22 and June 5, 1.59 tonnes of PET bottles were collected, compared with 4.83 tonnes last year, an official from the Department of Environmental Sanitation and Toxic Substance Management said. More than 27,700 people took part in the cleanup, picking up 202.5 tonnes of trash, the EPA said, adding that of that volume, 9.7 tonnes were recyclable garbage such as PET bottles, iron cans, aluminum cans, glass and paper. The non-recyclable garbage included Styrofoam and fishing equipment, the EPA said.
RESOURCES
Tap water facilities checked
Taiwan Water Corp announced yesterday that it had inspected the nation’s tap water facilities in preparation for the coming rainy season, with results showing that among the 6,886 tap water facilities, 99.31 percent were operating normally. The inspections of 124 operating tap water supply sites nationwide covered six categories — water intake, storage, channeling, purification, delivery and distribution. Water supply disaster prevention and operation response training courses were held before May to teach staff how to deal with high turbidity levels that could occur after torrential rains. Preparatory work was done to provide the public with stable tap water during the rainy season, Taiwan Water Corp president Chen Fu-Tien (陳福田) said, adding that water supplies from reservoirs were stable, with those in the south a bit lower than in other areas, while water was abundant in the north.
WEATHER
Taipei mercury hits 36.3°C
Taipei yesterday saw the temperature spike at 36.3°C — the highest so far this summer, according to the Central Weather Bureau. Nationwide, the highest temperature was recorded in Dawu Township (大武) in Taitung County at 37.8°C. The bureau said foehn winds — a hot dry wind blowing down the rainshadow side of the mountains — were responsible for Taitung’s scorching heat. However, the bureau said the heat of summer was just getting started. From January 2000 to July last year, the higest temperature recorded in Taipei was 38.6°C. Even the 20th-highest temperature in the past 10 years was still 0.8°C hotter than yesterday’s mark.
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