HEALTH
Dengue fever case confirmed
An indigenous case of dengue fever has been confirmed in Greater Kaohsiung following a group infection in Greater Tainan earlier this month, an official of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday. A 12-year-old boy developed flu-like symptoms, including a fever and a rash, on May 12 and was taken to a hospital, where he tested positive for dengue fever antigen on May 16. However, the boy, who lives in Nanzih District (楠梓), was not confirmed to have dengue fever until Tuesday, said Liu Shih-hao (劉士豪), director of the CDC’s public relations office. The boy’s mother also tested positive for dengue, said Tsai Wu-hsiung (蔡武雄), director of the Kaohsiung Health Department’s Center for Disease Control. The annual high season for dengue fever runs from June through August, Liu said.
AGRICULTURE
Torrential rain causes losses
Agricultural losses have grown to NT$35.05 million (US$1.19 million) in seven counties and cities since May 17, when torrential rain began to batter those areas, Council of Agriculture statistics released yesterday showed. Because of the storm damage, the price of leafy vegetables rose to NT$26 per kilogram in Taipei’s fruit and vegetable wholesale markets from NT$21.5 per kilogram recorded on May 16, according to statistics posted on the council’s Web site. The council said that crop losses in Greater Taichung, Greater Kao-hsiung and Greater Tainan, along with Pingtung, Yunlin, Changhua and Nantou counties, were NT$34.6 million. The area of damage to crop-growing farmland reached 2,290 hectares, accounting for 14 percent of the total.
SOCIETY
Lessons for dog owners
Starting next year, would-be dog owners in New Taipei City (新北市) will be eligible for various free services for their pets if they attend a two-hour lesson on how to look after a pet properly, a city official said. The incentives include exemption from pet registration fees and free pet chip IDs, cremation and neutering subsidies worth about NT$4,000, it said. The new regulations will be promoted from the middle of July, after which the public will be encouraged to attend the class, which teaches responsible pet ownership, it said. The purpose of the regulations is to help combat the high level of pet abandonment.
SOCIETY
Marriage on the increase
The nation recorded 49,558 marriages between January and last month, an increase of 1.7 percent compared with the same period last year, according to Ministry of the Interior statistics. Among the married couples, 85.7 percent were Taiwanese and 14.3 percent were international marriages, the ministry said. The number of international marriages increased by 0.2 percentage points from the same period last year, the ministry said. The majority of cross-border marriages involved a Chinese spouse (63.1 percent), while Southeast Asian spouses accounted for 22.4 percent and the remaining 14.5 percent were from other countries, it said. The average age of a Taiwanese woman getting married for the first time rose last year to a record 29.4, while the average age of first-time grooms has remained at about 31.8 for the past two years, the data showed. The average age of men who were re-marrying was 44.2 years, while for women it was 38.2, a slight drop compared with 2010.
An increase in Taiwanese boats using China-made automatic identification systems (AIS) could confuse coast guards patrolling waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast and become a loophole in the national security system, sources familiar with the matter said yesterday. Taiwan ADIZ, a Facebook page created by enthusiasts who monitor Chinese military activities in airspace and waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast, on Saturday identified what seemed to be a Chinese cargo container ship near Penghu County. The Coast Guard Administration went to the location after receiving the tip and found that it was a Taiwanese yacht, which had a Chinese AIS installed. Similar instances had also
GOOD DIPLOMACY: The KMT has maintained close contact with representative offices in Taiwan and had extended an invitation to Russia as well, the KMT said The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) would “appropriately handle” the fallout from an invitation it had extended to Russia’s representative to Taipei to attend its international banquet last month, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday. US and EU representatives in Taiwan boycotted the event, and only later agreed to attend after the KMT rescinded its invitation to the Russian representative. The KMT has maintained long-term close contact with all representative offices and embassies in Taiwan, and had extended the invitation as a practice of good diplomacy, Chu said. “Some EU countries have expressed their opinions of Russia, and the KMT respects that,” he
VIGILANCE: The military is paying close attention to actions that might damage peace and stability in the region, the deputy minister of national defense said The People’s Republic of China (PRC) might consider initiating a hack on Taiwanese networks on May 20, the day of the inauguration ceremony of president-elect William Lai (賴清德), sources familiar with cross-strait issues said. While US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s statement of the US expectation “that all sides will conduct themselves with restraint and prudence in the period ahead” would prevent military actions by China, Beijing could still try to sabotage Taiwan’s inauguration ceremony, the source said. China might gain access to the video screens outside of the Presidential Office Building and display embarrassing messages from Beijing, such as congratulating Lai
Four China Coast Guard ships briefly sailed through prohibited waters near Kinmen County, Taipei said, urging Beijing to stop actions that endanger navigation safety. The Chinese ships entered waters south of Kinmen, 5km from the Chinese city of Xiamen, at about 3:30pm on Monday, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement later the same day. The ships “sailed out of our prohibited and restricted waters” about an hour later, the agency said, urging Beijing to immediately stop “behavior that endangers navigation safety.” Ministry of National Defense spokesman Sun Li-fang (孫立方) yesterday told reporters that Taiwan would boost support to the Coast Guard