A medical team from Kaohsiung has said that people in the nation’s southwestern areas, remote districts and outlying islands are at the most risk of contracting hepatitis C.
The group of physicians from Kaohsiung Chang Gung Memorial Hospital and Kaohsiung Medical University last week released a map, titled the “Taiwan hepatitis C risk map,” that showed districts in the nation’s southwest in places such as Yunlin, Chiayi, Tainan and Kaohsiung, and remote districts of eastern Taiwan and outlying islands as being at high risk.
Lu Sheng-nan (盧勝男), a physician at Kaohsiung Chang Gung Memorial Hospital’s Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, said that the prevalence rate of hepatitis C in Kaohsiung’s Zihguan District (梓官), for example, is higher than 15 percent, compared with the national average prevalence rate of between 3 percent and 5 percent.
Lu said that a higher prevalence rate in southwestern areas is mainly caused by the practice of seeking medical treatment from unlicensed medical practitioners in the past, associated with not disinfecting needles thoroughly and abusive use of drugs.
As for the about 10 percent prevalence rate in remote areas, Lu said it might be caused by inconvenient traffic and insufficient medical resources, adding that people in such areas might be unwilling to lose a day’s income by traveling to metropolitan areas for medical treatment, or might not even know they are hepatitis C carriers.
Dai Chia-yen (戴嘉言), a physician at Kaohsiung Medical University Chung-ho Memorial Hospital’s Department of Hepatobiliary Medicine, said that in order to improve the accessibility of medical services in such areas, the hospitals have formed a medical team to provide examinations for screening liver diseases and related treatment in the areas.
Bringing more medical services to such areas has proved to be more effective than waiting for residents to visit hospitals for treatment after receiving health examinations reports, Dai said.
He said a team from Kaohsiung Medical University Chung-ho Memorial Hospital, who established a special outpatient service session at Zihguan District’s local health bureau in 2014 and provided services every two weeks, has discovered more than 2,000 hepatitis C carriers from 15,000 people screened.
Lu said hepatitis C can be cured, but it is important to discover the infection and get treatment as early as possible, and that chronicle hepatitis C carriers must get follow-up liver examinations regularly to avoid the disease progressing to liver cancer.
Lu said that to prevent damage to the liver, people should live a healthy lifestyle, including getting enough sleep, sleeping early and avoiding smoking, drinking liquor or consuming unknown drugs.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
DEADLOCK: As the commission is unable to forum a quorum to review license renewal applications, the channel operators are not at fault and can air past their license date The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday said that the Public Television Service (PTS) and 36 other television and radio broadcasters could continue airing, despite the commission’s inability to meet a quorum to review their license renewal applications. The licenses of PTS and the other channels are set to expire between this month and June. The National Communications Commission Organization Act (國家通訊傳播委員會組織法) stipulates that the commission must meet the mandated quorum of four to hold a valid meeting. The seven-member commission currently has only three commissioners. “We have informed the channel operators of the progress we have made in reviewing their license renewal applications, and
RSS