Chunghwa Post next week is to publish a list of underused premises in the six special municipalities that are to be used as long-term care service centers by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, the company said yesterday.
It is also to roll out long-term care insurance that would be available to older people in the final quarter of this year, the company added.
The plan to convert underused facilities into nursing homes is part of a campaign Chunghwa Post launched in August last year with the Ministry of Transportation and Communications to meet the challenges posed by the nation’s transition into a superannuated society.
Photo courtesy of Chunghwa Post
Minister of Transportation and Communications Hochen Tan (賀陳旦) last year asked Chunghwa Post to supply a tally of underused post offices and draw up plans to convert them into nursing homes by partnering with private companies.
A preliminary review of its facilities showed that the company would be able to free up one facility in each of the six special municipalities: Nangang Post Office in Taipei to be overseen by Keelung Hospital; Wugu Post Office in New Taipei City to be overseen by Taipei Hospital; Lujhu Post Office in Taoyuan to be overseen by Taoyuan Hospital; Wujih Post Office in Taichung to be overseen by Taichung Hospital; Yuandian Post Office in Tainan to be overseen by Tainan Hospital; and Fongshan Post Office in Kaohsiung to be overseen by the Cishan Hospital.
The aforementioned branch offices would become “long-term care service boarding facilities,” and could each provide 70 to 100 beds, Chunghwa Post said.
Hochen believes that the company, with more than 1,300 branches nationwide, could add more of its buildings to the list, Chunghwa Post chief secretary Chien Liang-lin (簡良璘) said, adding that the company would continue to assess the possibility of converting more offices.
This list would not be finalized until next week, and the company is still deliberating whether to just lease its premises at a preferential price or also become involved in long-term care services, Chien said.
The long-term care insurance would be a low-premium, high-compensation insurance plan and would pay out according to the conditions of the insured person, the company said.
For instance, older people who have limited mobility or cannot take care of themselves would be eligible for compensation either in a lump sum or a monthly payment, it 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