Several countries in the Asia-Pacific region have expressed an interest in Taiwan’s achievements in military medicine — a branch of medicine that attends to the needs of military personnel — a senior military official said on Saturday.
Officials from several countries — including Taiwan’s diplomatic and non-diplomatic allies — last year and this year visited the Tri-Service General Hospital and other military medical centers in the nation, the source said on condition of anonymity.
They expressed an interest in the construction, planning, structure, organization and operations of Taiwan’s national-level military medical centers, as well as the allocation of advanced medical resources, the source said.
The officials said they would continue to push for exchanges and cooperation through visits and discussions, the source added.
Last year, Ministry of National Defense Medical Affairs Bureau Director-General Chen Jiann-torng (陳建同), who was then deputy director-general, led a Taiwanese delegation to the Asia-Pacific Military Health Exchange in Singapore, the source added.
The delegation presented Taiwan’s achievements in military medicine, as well as several important studies, at the exchange, the source said.
The results and studies received a positive response from other nations’ representatives, who sought opportunities to visit Taiwan, the source said.
Cohosted by China and the US, this year’s exchange is to be held in Xian in September, the source said.
While it would be inappropriate for Taiwanese military personnel to attend this year’s exchange, representatives from several countries who attended past exchanges told Taiwan that this would not affect the potential for the nation to engage in exchanges with these countries, the source said.
Former minister of national defense Feng Shih-kuan (馮世寬) last year praised the efforts of military medical units that participated in international medical exchanges.
At a meeting at the end of last year, he listed their achievements, including participating in the Singapore exchange, the International Conference on Disaster and Military Medicine and the World Dental Congress; hosting the first Taipei International Military Medicine Forum; and signing memorandums of understanding with five medical universities, including the Uniformed Services University in Bethesda, Maryland.
In related news, Taiwan is to participate in the US Navy’s Pacific Partnership humanitarian relief training mission in the Solomon Islands next month.
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
The first bluefin tuna of the season, brought to shore in Pingtung County and weighing 190kg, was yesterday auctioned for NT$10,600 (US$333.5) per kilogram, setting a record high for the local market. The auction was held at the fish market in Donggang Fishing Harbor, where the Siaoliouciou Island-registered fishing vessel Fu Yu Ching No. 2 delivered the “Pingtung First Tuna” it had caught for bidding. Bidding was intense, and the tuna was ultimately jointly purchased by a local restaurant and a local company for NT$10,600 per kilogram — NT$300 ,more than last year — for a total of NT$2.014 million. The 67-year-old skipper
BREACH OF CONTRACT: The bus operators would seek compensation and have demanded that the manufacturer replace the chips with ones that meet regulations Two bus operators found to be using buses with China-made chips are to demand that the original manufacturers replace the systems and provide compensation for breach of contract, the Veterans Affairs Council said yesterday. Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Michelle Lin (林楚茵) yesterday said that Da Nan Bus Co and Shin-Shin Bus Co Ltd have fielded a total of 82 buses that are using Chinese chips. The bus models were made by Tron-E, while the systems provider was CYE Electronics, Lin said. Lin alleged that the buses were using chips manufactured by Huawei subsidiary HiSilicon Co, which presents a national security risk if the
RSS