HEALTH
Blood donations urged
The Taiwan Blood Services Foundation on Friday issued an urgent call for blood donations, as the supply in several areas had fallen below the officially designated safe level of seven days. The shortages were most severe in Taipei and Hsinchu, which had an average stock of less than three days, with supplies of blood types AB and O running especially low, the foundation said, adding Kaohsiung and Taichung also had shortages, with average remaining stocks of 4.6 days and 5.1 days respectively. Blood reserves in northern Taiwan were especially low, likely because of a drop in donations due to the cold weather in the past few days, said Hung Ying-sheng (洪英聖), a representative of the foundation.
RAILWAYS
Holiday ticket sale starts
Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp is to start selling tickets for the Lunar New Year holiday tomorrow, the company said. A total of 1,820 of its trains would run from Feb. 8 to Feb. 17 to meet demand over the week-long holiday, which starts on Feb. 11, including 441 extra trains, 236 southbound and 205 northbound, the company said, adding that this is a 30 percent boost in capacity. Passengers can book tickets through its T-Express mobile ticketing system, its Web site, by telephone, at most chain convenience stores and at THSRC ticketing counters, it said. The company would offer its usual discounts of 10 to 35 percent for university students and for purchases made five to 28 days in advance of the travel date, it added.
SOCIETY
Fewer married last year
The number of marriages in Taiwan last year dropped to the lowest in more than a decade, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday. Ministry data showed 121,702 new registered marriages, a decline of 12,822 from in 2019 and the lowest number since 2009, when 116,392 couples married amid a global financial crisis. Of the new marriages registered last year, 2,387 were between same-sex couples, a slight decline from 2019, when Taiwan legalized same-sex marriage and 2,939 couples wed — 928 male and 2,011 female, the data showed. Last year, 674 same-sex marriages were between men and 1,713 between women, it showed. The number of divorces was 51,680, down 2,793 from 2019, with 371 among same-sex couples, the data showed.
CRIME
Money transfer ring busted
The Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office on Friday indicted three people for alleged breaches of the Banking Act (銀行法) related to an illegal underground money transfer network targeting migrant workers from the Philippines. The three are a Taiwanese surnamed Yang (楊) who operates an overseas labor agency and an import-export business based in Taipei, his employee surnamed Chen (陳), and the Taiwan branch manager of a Philippine money transfer company, also surnamed Chen. In 2017, the three allegedly began offering illegal money transfer services to migrant workers and more recently to overseas Taiwanese businesses, the prosecutors said, adding that their operations allegedly generated profits of about NT$400 million (US$14.06 million). The prosecutors said that they have issued a warrant for the arrest of another person of interest surnamed Wang (王), who has been in hiding in the Philippines since local authorities began investigating the case in January last year.
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it
Taiwan's Gold Apollo Co (金阿波羅通信) said today that the pagers used in detonations in Lebanon the day before were not made by it, but by a company called BAC which has a license to use its brand. At least nine people were killed and nearly 3,000 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members detonated simultaneously across Lebanon yesterday. Images of destroyed pagers analyzed by Reuters showed a format and stickers on the back that were consistent with pagers made by Gold Apollo. A senior Lebanese security source told Reuters that Hezbollah had ordered 5,000 pagers from Taiwan-based Gold Apollo. "The product was not
COLD FACTS: ‘Snow skin’ mooncakes, made with a glutinous rice skin and kept at a low temperature, have relatively few calories compared with other mooncakes Traditional mooncakes are a typical treat for many Taiwanese in the lead-up to the Mid-Autumn Festival, but a Taipei-based dietitian has urged people not to eat more than one per day and not to have them every day due to their high fat and calorie content. As mooncakes contain a lot of oil and sugar, they can have negative health effects on older people and those with diabetes, said Lai Yu-han (賴俞含), a dietitian at Taipei Hospital of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. “The maximum you can have is one mooncake a day, and do not eat them every day,” Lai