Costco Taiwan yesterday presented a plan to compensate customers who had purchased frozen mixed berry products that were later found to be contaminated with the hepatitis A virus.
Costco members who bought the frozen berries at its Kaohsiung warehouse would be offered a full refund plus compensation equivalent to the refund amount, the Kaohsiung Department of Administrative and International Affairs, quoting Costco, said in a statement.
Costco is also to offer a subsidy of NT$500 (US$16.27) to any members who after consulting a doctor at healthcare facilities designated by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) undergo an immunoglobulin test for hepatitis A, the department said.
Photo: Reuters
In addition, Costco is to pay the full medical bill of any member diagnosed with hepatitis A that could be traced to the contaminated berry products, which were sold under Costco’s Kirkland Signature brand, the department said.
The US last month reported that five people tested positive for hepatitis A, likely due to consuming store-bought frozen berries, after which a number of brands recalled their products from retailers.
On April 11, the department asked Costco to remove frozen berries from its shelves as a preventive measure, and began sample inspections on five brands of frozen berry products.
On April 28, after tests on the Kirkland Signature Three Berry Blend imported from Chile were positive for the hepatitis A virus, the department ordered the product to be removed and destroyed.
On Tuesday last week, Kaohsiung consumer protection officers summoned Costco managers to city hall and told the company to present a compensation plan by Tuesday last week, which must include medical expenses and other related costs incurred by consumers of the berries, the statement issued yesterday said.
The company has since been fined NT$7.5 million, the Kaohsiung City Government said.
As of yesterday, 39,129.59kg of Costo’s frozen berries had been recalled, the Ministry of Health and Welfare said.
Meanwhile, the Kaohsiung Consumer Protection Office said it had received nine cases related to the contaminated berry products.
Commenting on the issue, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Director Wu Shou-mei (吳秀梅) said the agency had received a report from Costco about the matter, but the information was insufficient.
For example, there was no information about health checks for Costco personnel or improvements in the company’s Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point system, which is a scientific and systematic approach to identify, assess and control food hazards, Wu said.
The FDA has asked Costco to provide supplementary documentation within two weeks, she said.
Additional reporting by Hsu Li-chuan
Taiwan is to receive the first batch of Lockheed Martin F-16 Block 70 jets from the US late this month, a defense official said yesterday, after a year-long delay due to a logjam in US arms deliveries. Completing the NT$247.2 billion (US$7.69 billion) arms deal for 66 jets would make Taiwan the third nation in the world to receive factory-fresh advanced fighter jets of the same make and model, following Bahrain and Slovakia, the official said on condition of anonymity. F-16 Block 70/72 are newly manufactured F-16 jets built by Lockheed Martin to the standards of the F-16V upgrade package. Republic of China
Taiwan-Japan Travel Passes are available for use on public transit networks in the two countries, Taoyuan Metro Corp said yesterday, adding that discounts of up to 7 percent are available. Taoyuan Metro, the Taipei MRT and Japan’s Keisei Electric Railway teamed up to develop the pass. Taoyuan Metro operates the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport MRT Line, while Keisei Electric Railway offers express services between Tokyo’s Narita Airport, and the Keisei Ueno and Nippori stations in the Japanese capital, as well as between Narita and Haneda airports. The basic package comprises one one-way ticket on the Taoyuan MRT Line and one Skyliner ticket on
EVERYONE’S ISSUE: Kim said that during a visit to Taiwan, she asked what would happen if China attacked, and was told that the global economy would shut down Taiwan is critical to the global economy, and its defense is a “here and now” issue, US Representative Young Kim said during a roundtable talk on Taiwan-US relations on Friday. Kim, who serves on the US House of Representatives’ Foreign Affairs Committee, held a roundtable talk titled “Global Ties, Local Impact: Why Taiwan Matters for California,” at Santiago Canyon College in Orange County, California. “Despite its small size and long distance from us, Taiwan’s cultural and economic importance is felt across our communities,” Kim said during her opening remarks. Stanford University researcher and lecturer Lanhee Chen (陳仁宜), lawyer Lin Ching-chi
A pro-Russia hacker group has launched a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack on the Taiwanese government in retaliation for President William Lai’s (賴清德) comments suggesting that China should have a territorial dispute with Russia, an information security company said today. The hacker group, NoName057, recently launched an HTTPs flood attack called “DDoSia” targeting Taiwanese government and financial units, Radware told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). Local tax bureaus in New Taipei City, Keelung, Hsinchu and Taoyuan were mentioned by the hackers. Only the Hsinchu Local Tax Bureau site appeared to be down earlier in the day, but was back
RSS