The Legislative Yuan on Monday passed a bill to resolve medical disputes by requiring people and hospitals go through mediation in civil and criminal cases before resorting to the courts.
Under the bill — which is to be implemented pending an announcement by the Executive Yuan — medical institutions are prohibited from refusing to provide medical records to patients or their families and attorneys during the mediation process.
Those who contravene the rules would be fined NT$50,000 to NT$250,000, with further financial sanctions if the breach is not corrected, the bill says.
The bill was proposed by the Cabinet on April 28.
In addition, the Cabinet said that to avoid medical disputes, some doctors have shunned certain areas of medicine where the risk of disputes with patients is statistically higher.
The bill requires local governments to set up their own mediation committees, at which patients or their families and attorneys, and doctors can discuss disputes and work to reach an agreement.
Mediation would continue for up to three months, and if both sides agree, for an additional three months.
Mediation committees should include medical experts, legal professionals and those with necessary knowledge from third parties, and can have between nine and 45 members, the bill says.
It also requires members from outside the medical profession, while males and females must have at least one-third representation.
The bill requires hospitals to establish a special task force within five days of a medical dispute occurring to communicate with patients, their families and attorneys.
The task force is expected to provide necessary assistance to patients and their families or attorneys to promote better communication.
Medical disputes that are under investigation or that are before a court when the new law goes into force would not be subject to the new requirements.
AGGRESSION: China’s latest intrusions set a new benchmark for its ‘gray zone’ tactics and possibly a new pattern that it would attempt to normalize, a researcher said China’s latest military exercises represent a new challenge to Taiwan’s legal authority to demarcate its borders in the Taiwan Strait, a defense expert said, adding that the fleets in the latest exercises were likely the most powerful the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) ever assembled. The PLA conducted military exercises from Sunday last week to 6am on Friday, which encompassed large swathes of the western Pacific, including the Taiwan Strait and waters off the Philippines and Guam, National Policy Foundation associate research fellow Chieh Chung (揭仲) said on Friday. The Ministry of National Defense said that it detected 70 warship and 162 aircraft
DOMESTIC MARKET: To protect the livelihoods of local egg farmers, the government adopted a new method for releasing imported eggs, the agriculture minister said More than 54 million imported eggs will be disposed, as their expiration date has passed, Minister of Agriculture Chen Chi-chung (陳吉仲) said yesterday. Chen made the remarks at a news conference in Taipei, explaining the flow of imported eggs following recent controversies regarding the products. The ministry introduced a special egg import program to address a nationwide egg shortage earlier this year. However, controversies have risen in recent weeks. These included an accusation that the government helped some egg importing companies over others, eggs imported from Brazil that had an incorrect expiration date, and egg shipments from Brazil that were found
PACIFIC OCEAN: Defense experts have warned that the ‘Shandong,’ China’s second largest aircraft carrier, poses a serious threat to eastern Taiwan’s defenses The drills conducted by the Chinese aircraft carrier Shandong in the Western Pacific last week were more aimed at showcasing China’s military capabilities to the US rather than toward Taiwan, a Taiwanese defense expert said yesterday. Lin Yin-yu (林穎佑), an assistant professor at Tamkang University’s Graduate Institute of International Affairs and Strategic Studies, said the drills which involved dozens of warplanes sought to test China’s anti-access and area denial capabilities should the US and its allies attempt to interfere in a cross-strait conflict. Lin said that the latest Chinese drills coincided with a joint maritime exercise conducted by the US, South Korea
Thousands of bottles of Sriracha have been returned or destroyed after the discovery of excessive sulfur dioxide, a bleaching agent, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced on Tuesday. About 12,600 bottles totaling 9,991.8kg of the hot sauce imported from the US by Emporium Corp (河洛企業) were flagged at the border for containing illegal levels of sulfur dioxide, the FDA said in its regular border inspection announcement. Inspectors discovered 0.5g per kilogram of the common bleaching agent and preservative, higher than the 0.03g permitted, it said. As it is the first time within six months the product has been flagged, Sriracha products from