The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it would provide 95 sessions of government-funded adult health examinations starting on Jan. 27 and would encourage residents who have recently turned 40 to undergo health checks.
Cancer ranked first among the top 10 causes of death in Taipei last year, accounting for 28.9 percent of all deaths, and chronic diseases — including cancer, heart disease, cerebrovascular disease, kidney disease and diabetes — accounted for 63.8 percent of mortality overall.
Taipei Department of Health Commissioner Huang Shier-chieg (黃世傑) said that people older than 40 often neglect their health because they are busy working, but chronic diseases often start out with no or mild symptoms and get progressively worse over a long time until they start causing various complications.
By the time symptoms become obvious, condition are likely to already have seriously affected a person’s health and life quality, Huang said, adding that undergoing regular health checkups is crucial in detecting chronic diseases at an earlier stage.
The initial symptoms of many chronic diseases — even cancer — are mild, but if people neglect regular health exams, they might miss the window of opportunity for effective treatment, Taipei City Hospital Renai Branch attending physician Wu Tai-ying (吳岱穎) said.
The Health Promotion Administration’s data on integrated health exams in 2015 showed that the average rate of hypertension was 20.2 percent, high blood sugar was found in 8.9 percent of patients and high blood lipids were detected in 28 percent, she said, adding studies have suggested that large-scale health exams are effective in reducing the incidence of many chronic diseases, as well as mortality rates.
As of September last year, the national turnout rate for government-funded health exams for adults aged 40 to 64 was 27.88 percent, but the rate in Taipei was only 15.68 percent, the department said.
REMINDERS
To encourage eligible residents to undergo checkups — including the adult health examination and screening for cervical, colon, oral cavity and breast cancers — the department said it would organize 95 sessions of the integrated health exams at 16 designated hospitals.
Adults aged from 40 to 64 are eligible for a free examination once every three years, while people aged 65 and older are eligible for a free examination once a year.
An estimated 46,000 city residents that have turned 40 are to be informed by mail this year.
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Friday condemned Chinese and Russian authorities for escalating regional tensions, citing Chinese warplanes crossing the Taiwan Strait’s median line and joint China-Russia military activities breaching South Korea’s air defense identification zone (KADIZ) over the past two days. A total of 30 Chinese warplanes crossed the median line of the Taiwan Strait on Thursday and Friday, entering Taiwan’s northern and southwestern airspace in coordination with 15 naval vessels and three high-altitude balloons, the MAC said in a statement. The Chinese military also carried out another “joint combat readiness patrol” targeting Taiwan on Thursday evening, the MAC said. On
Singapore is to allow imports of Taiwanese raw pork for the first time in 15 years, the Ministry of Agriculture said yesterday. The Singapore Food Agency has approved imports of fresh pork produced by New Taipei City-based Cha I Shan Foods, which had obtained a Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) certification from the ministry to export to Singapore, it said. The ministry said it had hoped Singapore would permit Taiwanese fresh pork imports in addition to processed pork products. Singapore agreed to accept Taiwanese fresh pork after completing a document review and a virtual tour of Cha I Shan Foods’ packing
‘FACT-BASED’: There is no ban, and 2 million Taiwanese have traveled to China this year, which is more than the 285,000 Chinese who visited Taiwan, the council said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday accused China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) of shifting the blame for Beijing’s tourism ban on Taiwan, continuing a war of words that started in the past week. The council’s remark came hours after its Chinese counterpart on Friday accused the government of creating barriers to the resumption of reciprocal group tours across the Taiwan Strait. The TAO accused the MAC of releasing untruthful information and dragging its feet on the tourism sector’s call to establishing ferries linking Pingtung County to China’s Pingtan Island. The MAC failed to respond to overtures to restore direct flights and raised the
Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) yesterday said the city “does not tolerate violence” after the Taipei City Council reported death threats over a planned screening today of a documentary on alleged forced organ harvesting in China. The council’s report follows a flurry of similar threats targeting theaters and institutions screening the documentary, titled State Organs, which accuses Chinese officials of harvesting organs from incarcerated dissidents and Falun Gong members. Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) city councilors who planned to screen the film told a news conference earlier yesterday that the organizers of the screening had received a threat of a knife attack signed
RSS