The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on Wednesday said 16.1 percent of cosmetic and personal care products it has inspected do not meet legal requirements, as they contain unregistered drug ingredients.
The FDA said it randomly sampled 130 cosmetic products sold online or in stores, as people might be considering buying them as gifts for Mother’s Day, which falls on May 14 this year.
Twenty-one products failed the inspection and 20 of them were found to contain drug ingredients that required registration, while a depilatory cream imported from Thailand contained calcium thioglycolate for hair removal and should have been registered as a drug, the FDA said.
All of the products that failed the inspection were imported, it added.
FDA official Huang Shou-chieh (黃守潔) said the products contained drugs such as salicylic acid, which is often used in acne treatment, and triclocarban, which is used in some antibacterial products.
All cosmetic and personal care products containing drugs, whether imported or domestically made, must be registered at the FDA for examination and approval before being sold online or in shops to protect consumers from developing allergic reactions or other adverse health effects, she said.
Huang said people convicted of selling such products without registration and approval from the FDA could face up to a year in prison or a fine up to NT$150,000 (US$4,977), and people convicted of importing drugs without approval could face up to 10 years in prison or a fine up to NT$100 million, in accordance with the Statute for Control of Cosmetic Hygiene (化粧品衛生管理條例).
A 72-year-old man in Kaohsiung was sentenced to 40 days in jail after he was found having sex with a 67-year-old woman under a slide in a public park on Sunday afternoon. At 3pm on Sunday, a mother surnamed Liang (梁) was with her child at a neighborhood park when they found the man, surnamed Tsai (蔡), and woman, surnamed Huang (黃), underneath the slide. Liang took her child away from the scene, took photographs of the two and called the police, who arrived and arrested the couple. During questioning, Tsai told police that he had met Huang that day and offered to
LOOKING NORTH: The base would enhance the military’s awareness of activities in the Bashi Channel, which China Coast Guard ships have been frequenting, an expert said The Philippine Navy on Thursday last week inaugurated a forward operating base in the country’s northern most province of Batanes, which at 185km from Taiwan would be strategically important in a military conflict in the Taiwan Strait. The Philippine Daily Inquirer quoted Northern Luzon Command Commander Lieutenant General Fernyl Buca as saying that the base in Mahatao would bolster the country’s northern defenses and response capabilities. The base is also a response to the “irregular presence this month of armed” of China Coast Guard vessels frequenting the Bashi Channel in the Luzon Strait just south of Taiwan, the paper reported, citing a
BETTER SERVICE QUALITY: From Nov. 10, tickets with reserved seats would only be valid for the date, train and route specified on the ticket, THSRC said Starting on Nov. 10, high-speed rail passengers with reserved seats would be required to exchange their tickets to board an earlier train. Passengers with reserved seats on a specific train are currently allowed to board earlier trains on the same day and sit in non-reserved cars, but as this is happening increasingly often, and affecting quality of travel and ticket sales, Taiwan High-Speed Rail Corp (THSRC) announced that it would be canceling the policy on Nov. 10. It is one of several new measures launched by THSRC chairman Shih Che (史哲) to improve the quality of service, it said. The company also said
A magnitude 6 earthquake last night at 9:11pm struck off northeastern Yilan County, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The earthquake’s epicenter was located in waters between Toucheng Township (頭城) and Turtle Island (Gueishan Island, 龜山島), about 22.1km northeast of Yilan County Hall at a depth of 112km, CWA data showed. There were no immediate reports of damage. The earthquake’s intensity, which gauges the actual effects of a temblor, was highest in Yilan’s Dongshan (冬山) and Nanao (南澳) townships and Taipei’s Xinyi District (信義), where it measured 4 on Taiwan’s seven-tier intensity scale. It measured 3 in other areas of Yilan and Taipei, as
RSS