A World Kidney Day fair was held in Taipei yesterday to raise public awareness about kidney health, as deaths related to kidney disease have become one of the top 10 causes of death in Taipei over the past two years.
The event, held by the Taipei City Department of Health and Taiwan Society of Nephrology at the Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Xinyi Plaza, saw medical personnel from 28 hospitals provide free health information and blood pressure readings.
World Kidney Day is an international awareness campaign that takes place on the second Thursday in March every year.
The department said that pyelonephritis (kidney inflammation), nephrotic syndrome and diabetic nephropathy were the seventh-highest causes of death in 2014.
A survey conducted by the central government’s Health Promotion Administration in 2007 showed that about one in 10 adults (aged more than 20) in Taiwan is likely to suffer from chronic kidney disease, it said, adding that people with high blood pressure, high blood cholesterol or diabetes are 1.58 to 2.35 times more likely to develop kidney disease than unaffected people.
Health Promotion Division director Lin Meng-hui (林夢蕙) suggested that people protect their kidneys by paying attention to their daily habits and having blood pressure and blood sugar levels checked regularly so that kidney disease might be detected at an early stage, and to have regular check-up examinations if kidney disease is found.
Diabetes is one of the primary causes of kidney deterioration, so diabetics are encouraged to have urine microalbumin tests and retinal examinations regularly, she added.
The Taiwan Society of Nephrology said people can protect their kidneys by exercising regularly, eating a balanced diet, maintaining a normal body weight, drinking more water, not smoking or over using drugs and by having regular health examinations.
Taiwanese can file complaints with the Tourism Administration to report travel agencies if their activities caused termination of a person’s citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday, after a podcaster highlighted a case in which a person’s citizenship was canceled for receiving a single-use Chinese passport to enter Russia. The council is aware of incidents in which people who signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of Russia were told they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, Chiu told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Taipei. However, the travel agencies actually applied
Japanese footwear brand Onitsuka Tiger today issued a public apology and said it has suspended an employee amid allegations that the staff member discriminated against a Vietnamese customer at its Taipei 101 store. Posting on the social media platform Threads yesterday, a user said that an employee at the store said that “those shoes are very expensive” when her friend, who is a migrant worker from Vietnam, asked for assistance. The employee then ignored her until she asked again, to which she replied: "We don't have a size 37." The post had amassed nearly 26,000 likes and 916 comments as of this
New measures aimed at making Taiwan more attractive to foreign professionals came into effect this month, the National Development Council said yesterday. Among the changes, international students at Taiwanese universities would be able to work in Taiwan without a work permit in the two years after they graduate, explainer materials provided by the council said. In addition, foreign nationals who graduated from one of the world’s top 200 universities within the past five years can also apply for a two-year open work permit. Previously, those graduates would have needed to apply for a work permit using point-based criteria or have a Taiwanese company
The Shilin District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday indicted two Taiwanese and issued a wanted notice for Pete Liu (劉作虎), founder of Shenzhen-based smartphone manufacturer OnePlus Technology Co (萬普拉斯科技), for allegedly contravening the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例) by poaching 70 engineers in Taiwan. Liu allegedly traveled to Taiwan at the end of 2014 and met with a Taiwanese man surnamed Lin (林) to discuss establishing a mobile software research and development (R&D) team in Taiwan, prosecutors said. Without approval from the government, Lin, following Liu’s instructions, recruited more than 70 software
RSS