The Executive Yuan yesterday approved the long-term care 3.0 program’s implementation starting next year, which is to feature reduced waiting time for outpatients to receive care and expanded geographical coverage of facilities.
Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) approved the Ministry of Health and Welfare plan and instructed it to prepare for its rollout by working closely with the private sector, Cabinet spokesperson Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a post-Cabinet meeting news conference in Taipei.
Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Lue Jen-der (呂建德) during the meeting reported on the program’s achievements and unveiled its targets, an Executive Yuan statement said.
Photo: Huang Mei-chu, Taipei Times
Long-term care 2.0, the current iteration of the program, owed its success to collaboration between the public and private sectors, Lue said.
Since 2016, the number of program recipients has increased 8.4 times to 756,000, its workforce increased fourfold to 100,000 and funding increased 18.7 times to NT$92.6 billion (US$2.81 billion), he said.
Long-term care facilities increased 20.9 times to 15,000 and the average waiting period for out-of-hospital patients for receiving care decreased 13 times to four days during the same period, he added.
Nearly 90 percent of program recipients were satisfied with the services provided, the statement cited Lue as saying.
The new version of the program is to focus on building a long-term care facility within 10 minutes’ drive of every household while improving the quality of care, he said.
The program would divide Taiwan into administrative regions, he added.
It would decrease the average waiting time for outpatients to obtain the services of carers, an area in which the ministry has already made strides, Lue was cited as saying.
The target is to reduce waiting times to minus-one day, meaning long-term care arrangements would be made the day before a patient leaves hospital, he said.
The program would integrate hospitals and long-term care to boost the quality of care for moderately or severely impaired people, Lue said.
The number of recipients would be increased from people aged 65 and older, indigenous people aged 55 and older, and people with disabilities to younger age groups, he said.
Medical data showed the average age of stroke victims is declining in Taiwan, he added.
The centerpiece of the new program is making improvements to community-based care as envisioned in the current program, ministry officials were cited as saying.
The program would additionally pre-emptively promote health, strengthening family-based care solutions, making better use of algorithms, implementing end-of-life care, and facilitating career education and training, they said.
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
NAMING SPAT: The foreign ministry called on Denmark to propose an acceptable solution to the erroneous nationality used for Taiwanese on residence permits Taiwan has revoked some privileges for Danish diplomatic staff over a Danish permit that lists “Taiwan” as “China,” Eric Huang (黃鈞耀), head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Department of European Affairs, told a news conference in Taipei yesterday. Reporters asked Huang whether the Danish government had responded to the ministry’s request that it correct the nationality on Danish residence permits of Taiwanese, which has been listed as “China” since 2024. Taiwan’s representative office in Denmark continues to communicate with the Danish government, and the ministry has revoked some privileges previously granted to Danish representatives in Taiwan and would continue to review
The first bluefin tuna of the season, brought to shore in Pingtung County and weighing 190kg, was yesterday auctioned for NT$10,600 (US$333.5) per kilogram, setting a record high for the local market. The auction was held at the fish market in Donggang Fishing Harbor, where the Siaoliouciou Island-registered fishing vessel Fu Yu Ching No. 2 delivered the “Pingtung First Tuna” it had caught for bidding. Bidding was intense, and the tuna was ultimately jointly purchased by a local restaurant and a local company for NT$10,600 per kilogram — NT$300 ,more than last year — for a total of NT$2.014 million. The 67-year-old skipper
BREACH OF CONTRACT: The bus operators would seek compensation and have demanded that the manufacturer replace the chips with ones that meet regulations Two bus operators found to be using buses with China-made chips are to demand that the original manufacturers replace the systems and provide compensation for breach of contract, the Veterans Affairs Council said yesterday. Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Michelle Lin (林楚茵) yesterday said that Da Nan Bus Co and Shin-Shin Bus Co Ltd have fielded a total of 82 buses that are using Chinese chips. The bus models were made by Tron-E, while the systems provider was CYE Electronics, Lin said. Lin alleged that the buses were using chips manufactured by Huawei subsidiary HiSilicon Co, which presents a national security risk if the
RSS