To combat allergies, runny noses and respiratory ailments during the cold season, traditional Chinese medicine physicians are advising use of a “3-9 medication pad.”
The pads are made of herbal ingredients and a traditional tonic, with a non-active sticky substance for application to the skin.
Chen San-yuan (陳三元), a doctor at the Chiayi Christian Hospital’s Department of Traditional Medicine, said the most suitable times during the year’s four seasons to regulate and tune up for health is during the “3-9 days” — the coldest period of winter, and the “3-Fu days” — the hottest time of summer.
He said that this belief stems from the sayings of ancient sages: “Train [the body] at ‘3-Fu’ in summer and at ‘3-9’ in winter.”
Chen said that training and tuning the body’s condition in the hot summer period of the “3-Fu Days,” can improve and strengthen endurance to the summer heat, thus preventing illness.
“To train and tune-up in the winter, can boost the body’s resistance to cold and prevent winter ailments,” he said.
The “3-9 medication pad” has evolved in traditional Eastern medicine to treat and tune-up the body for the cold winter.
“There is a long history for the ‘3-9 medication pad.’ According to modern research, when the pad is applied, it can reduce the eosinophil cationic protein count in the blood, which improves the body’s condition. It helps to protect the mast cell membranes and suppress the formation of immunoglobulin E,” Chen said.
Its summertime equivalent is the “3-Fu medication pad.”
Chen said research has shown that when patients apply the pads for three consecutive years in winter and in summer to the correct acupuncture points, they have been effective against symptoms of asthma and hay fever.
However, health improvements are best complemented by exercise, personal preventative therapy and traditional medicine, he said.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods