As a cold surge sweeps over Taiwan, the season’s lowest temperature — 3.4°C — was recorded in Miaoli County at 6:23am yesterday, former Central Weather Bureau Weather Forecast Center director Daniel Wu (吳德榮) said.
Although the mercury started to rise yesterday morning, another cold surge is expected to engulf the nation today and tomorrow, when temperatures are forecast to fall to below 10°C in northern Taiwan, said Wu, now an adjunct associate professor of atmospheric sciences at National Central University.
The cold wave is also expected to bring moisture to the nation’s north, which could cause snowfall above 2,000m in the mountains in northern and northeastern Taiwan, starting later today, he added.
Photo: CNA
In related news, a Changhua doctor on Friday warned against unsafe heating practices that could lead to fires, carbon monoxide poisoning or low-temperature burns.
One of the most common unsafe heating practices in Taiwan is burning coal or candles indoors, which is a fire hazard and can cause carbon monoxide poisoning, Changhua Christian Hospital critical care specialist Hsieh Pei-you (謝貝尤) said.
In addition, while ingesting alcohol makes people feel warm, it increases the risk of hypothermia by dilating the capillaries of the skin and diverting blood from the internal organs to the skin, she said.
As a result, inebriated people have a lower core body temperature and those who fall asleep outside in the cold often succumb to hypothermia, Hsieh said.
Electric heaters, blankets and hand warmers that come into direct and prolonged contact with the skin can cause low-temperature burns, especially in elderly people and infants, who might not be able to alert other people that they are hurting, she said.
People with diabetes are at risk of developing nerve damage, which reduces their sensitivity to high temperatures, and they might burn themselves with heaters or blankets without realizing, she said.
Stroke patients who cannot turn their bodies on their own frequently sustain low-temperature thermal damage from electric blankets, she added.
People should wrap heating packs in a layer of cloth before putting them in their pocket and should not place them under the blanket overnight, as these could also cause burns, she added.
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