AGRICULTURE
Yunlin turkeys culled
A total of 989 turkeys were culled at a farm in Yunlin County’s Sihu Township (西湖) after several were found to carry the highly pathogenic H5N2 avian influenza virus, the Council of Agriculture’s Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine said yesterday. The Yunlin County Animal and Plant Disease Control Center performed the culling based on standard operating procedures and advised the farm’s operators and other poultry farms in the area to disinfect their facilities. Bureau data showed that 97 poultry farms have been infected with avian flu so far this year. Because the risk of avian flu increases during the winter, the bureau urged farm operators to take preventive measures, including strict controls on movements of poultry, potentially contaminated vehicles and personnel.
HOSPITALITY
Westin Taipei closing
The five-star Westin Taipei hotel is ceasing operations today after a 20-year run, but the president of the group that operates the hotel said his company still has a bright future. Leofoo Tourism Group president Sean Chuang (莊秀石) has described the closure of the group’s flagship property as “a comma rather than a period,” saying that Leofoo is planning to open a new hotel elsewhere. The firm decided to close the Westin because it could not afford the high rent, Chuang said. The hotel first announced its closure in April, to the shock of loyal customers, and the hotel’s public relations department on Saturday said that the occupation rate was 80 percent or higher almost every day as the end of the year drew neared. Local media reports said that Leofoo is seeking to restructure its finances in the hope of returning to profitability next year.
HEALTHCARE
HIV policy change mulled
Taiwan might begin allowing HIV-positive people to donate organs to HIV-positive patients some time next year, Taiwan Organ Registry and Sharing Center Chairman Lee Po-chang (李伯璋) said on Friday, adding that he hoped legislation would be passed. In May, the Legislative Yuan passed an amendment to the HIV Infection Control and Patient Rights Protection Act (人類免疫缺乏病毒傳染防治及感染者權益保障條例) that gave HIV-positive people the choice of consenting to receiving organs from a donor with HIV. However, before such transplants could happen, the Regulations Governing the Transplantation and Allocation of Human Organs (人體器官移植分配及管理辦法) and another rule pertaining to the donor and recipient still need to be revised, Lee said. Five HIV-positive people are on waiting lists for organs, he said, adding that two need liver transplants, two need lungs and the other needs a cornea. Lee said he expects the two remaining amendments to be passed next year.
CRIME
Nineteen arrested over fraud
Three Taiwanese and sixteen Vietnamese were on Wednesday last week arrested in central Taiwan on suspicion of telecoms fraud targeting people in Vietnam, the Criminal Investigation Bureau said Fourteen of the Vietnamese suspects are runaway immigrant workers and two were on tourist visas, but strayed from their tour groups, the bureau said. Officers seized computers, mobile phones, victims’ information and other items at two locations in Taichung’s Shalu (沙鹿) and Taiping (太平) districts, which appeared to have been the bases of operations, it said. The evidence suggested that the ring had swindled about NT$15 million (US$488,075) from 200 people over three months, it said.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching