The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on Friday announced the top five types of drugs abused in Taiwan in the first 10 months of this year, saying that the use of sleeping pills has increased steadily over the past six years.
Heroin topped the list of most abused drugs for the sixth straight year, accounting for 66.8 percent of all substance abuse cases, followed by amphetamine and ketamine, which accounted for 33.1 percent and 5 percent respectively, the FDA said in a press release.
Zolpidem — a prescription medication used for the treatment of insomnia — accounted for 4.3 percent of all drug abuse cases, while ecstasy represented 3.4 percent.
The FDA said that the percentage of drug abuse cases involving Zolpidem was 0.7 percent in 2007, rising to 1.6 percent the following year. Last year, 2.3 percent of all substance abuse cases in Taiwan involved Zolpidem.
Chi Mei Hospital Psychiatry Department head Lin Jin-jia (林進嘉) said sleep difficulties can be caused by a variety of factors, including anxiety, depression and stress, and that overreliance on sleeping pills can lead to substance addiction.
Tsai Wen-ying (蔡文瑛), an official at the FDA, urged people suffering from sleeping disorders or pain to seek medical help.
Increasing the dosage of sleeping pills or painkillers without seeking medical advice can cause health problems, Tsai said.
According to the FDA, heroin is still the main culprit in drug abuse cases in Taiwan, accounting for more than 90 percent of case between 2007 and 2010, and 83.3 percent last year.
Ketamine abuse lingered at around 1 percent between 2007 and 2009, increasing to 1.5 percent in 2010 and 2.4 percent a year later. This year, that number doubled this year to 5 percent.
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
The eastern extension of the Taipei MRT Red Line could begin operations as early as late June, the Taipei Department of Rapid Transit Systems said yesterday. Taipei Rapid Transit Corp said it is considering offering one month of free rides on the new section to mark its opening. Construction progress on the 1.4km extension, which is to run from the current terminal Xiangshan Station to a new eastern terminal, Guangci/Fengtian Temple Station, was 90.6 percent complete by the end of last month, the department said in a report to the Taipei City Council's Transportation Committee. While construction began in October 2016 with an
NON-RED SUPPLY: Boosting the nation’s drone industry is becoming increasingly urgent as China’s UAV dominance could become an issue in a crisis, an analyst said Taiwan’s drone exports to Europe grew 41.7-fold from 2024 to last year, with demand from Ukraine’s fight against Russian aggression the most likely driver of growth, a study showed. The Institute for Democracy, Society and Emerging Technology (DSET) in a statement on Wednesday said it found that many of Taiwan’s uncrewed aerial vehicle (UAV) sales were from Poland and the Czech Republic. These countries likely transferred the drones to Ukraine to aid it in its fight against the Russian invasion that started in 2022, it said. Despite the gains, Taiwan is not the dominant drone exporter to these markets, ranking second and fourth
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comment last year on Tokyo’s potential reaction to a Taiwan-China conflict has forced Beijing to rewrite its invasion plans, a retired Japanese general said. Takaichi told the Diet on Nov. 7 last year that a Chinese naval blockade or military attack on Taiwan could constitute a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan, potentially allowing Tokyo to exercise its right to collective self-defense. Former Japan Ground Self-Defense Force general Kiyofumi Ogawa said in a recent speech that the remark has been interpreted as meaning Japan could intervene in the early stages of a Taiwan Strait conflict, undermining China’s previous assumptions
RSS