The Food and Drug Administration recalled 53 drugs altogether for testing

Taiwan News
Date: 2019/01/19
By: Ryan Drillsma, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Over the past few months, several popular heart and high blood pressure drugs have been recalled after they were discovered to contain potential cancer-causing particles.

The Ministry of Health and Welfare’s Food and Drug Administration inspected 142 active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) and 53 imported prepared medicines. The administration found 43 contained animal carcinogens of the type N-Nitrosodimethylamine or N-Nitrosodiethylamine, although not all the drugs that were recalled have been tested yet, NOWnews reports.

Head of the administration’s pharmaceutical group Hung Kuo-teng (洪國登) said the products in question have been assessed in line with international standards, and five APIs in popular heart medications, namely Valsartan, Losartan, Irbesartan, Olmesartan and Candesartan contained harmful components and have been taken under further investigation.

The 11 pharmaceutical companies that sold products containing carcinogens were all subdivisions of six larger holdings, four of which were from China, two from India.
[FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2019/01/19
By: Elaine Hou and Chung Yu-chen 

Taipei, Jan. 19 (CNA) Taiwan plans to invest US$150 million over a period of five years to finance cooperation projects in Paraguay, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said Saturday.

According to a memorandum of understanding (MOU) Taiwan signed with its last remaining South American diplomatic ally late last year, the cash will be used to develop Paraguay’s social assistance, education, housing and infrastructure.

Apart from a previously initiated public housing project, MOFA spokesman Andrew Lee (李憲章) said the Paraguayan government has expressed the wish that Taiwan can help improve the livelihoods of the Paraguayan people.

A Taiwanese diplomat once stationed in Paraguay said that the public housing project has helped improve the quality of life in rural areas of Paraguay.    [FULL  STORY]

STOP DISINFORMATION: The Council of Agriculture said that on Tuesday it reported a Facebook post with false information on pork in Taiwan to the Taipei Police Department

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 20, 2019
By: Lin Chia-nan  /  Staff reporter

People can safely eat domestic pork, as African swine fever has not spread in Taiwan,

Council of Agriculture Minister Chen Chi-chung (陳吉仲) said yesterday, calling on people not to disseminate misinformation about the disease.

Demand for pork products usually rises ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, but false information about the disease has affected domestic pork sales, Chen told a news conference in Taipei.

A netizen named Gina Lin this month on Facebook wrote that the disease had been found in Taoyuan and warned people not to eat pork products, the council said.

Disinformation could undercut quarantine work and might trigger panic, the council said, adding that on Tuesday it reported the post to the Taipei Police Department.
[FULL  STORY]

The New York Times
Date: Jan. 19, 2019
By Chris Horton

TAIPEI, Taiwan — Just a few weeks ago, President Tsai Ing-wen of Taiwan was struggling politically. Her party had lost in key local elections, imperiling her run for a second term next year.

But then she got help from an unlikely source: the president of China.

In a speech this month to the people of Taiwan, a self-ruled democracy that Beijing considers Chinese territory, President Xi Jinping said the island “must be and will be” united with China and warned that independence efforts could be met by armed force.

Mr. Xi’s speech raised anxieties in Taiwan that Ms. Tsai was able to tap into by delivering a rebuke of Mr. Xi’s proposal, in a rare departure from her usual cautious ambiguity.

“Democratic values are the values and way of life that Taiwanese cherish,” she said, “and we call upon China to bravely move toward democracy.”    [FULL  STORY]

Let’s check out the top four news this week

Taiwan News  
Date: 2019/01/18
By:  Taiwan News

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) –Top news this week includes China plans to take Taiwan by 2025: Former Japan Air Force Commander; Ed Sheeran to start Asia tour in Taiwan in April; Investigation begun after foreigner charged NT$400 for bag of fruit at Taipei night market; Yushan breaks record for latest snow in 66 years.    [SOURCE]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2019/01/18
By: Chen Chih-chung and Chung Yu-chen 

Taipei, Jan. 18 (CNA) A team of Taiwanese researchers and a tech company on Friday jointly unveiled what they called the world’s smallest AI chip, which is 0.7 centimeters square.

The chip was developed by National Taiwan Normal University’s (NTNU) Department of Electrical Engineering, in collaboration with the Taiwan branch of T1 Technologies Inc.

In addition to the “edge AI chip,” they also unveiled a “system development kit” (SDK), which is a collection of software used for developing applications for a specific device or operating system.

Within the emerging concept of edge computing, “the edge” is a theoretical space where a data center resource may be accessed in the minimum amount of time.    [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 19, 2019
By: Chiu Chih-jou and Sherry Hsiao  /  Staff reporter, with staff writer

Farmers who raise black pigs in Pingtung County have formed a self-help group as fears about the effects of African swine fever have resulted in sales coming to a standstill and increased scrutiny of farms that use food waste as feed.

Unlike their lighter-skinned counterparts, black pigs are raised in two stages, Pingtung hog farmers said on Wednesday.

Upstream farmers raise sows and piglets, then one to two months after the piglets have stopped nursing, they are sent to downstream farmers, who raise them until they are mature, they said.

This partnership between upstream and downstream farmers has existed for more than a decade, but since the government started subsidizing farmers who switch from using food waste as pig feed or give up farming altogether, downstream farmers have stopped placing orders, said Chiu Hsiu-chin (邱秀琴), a black pig farmer in Pingtung.    [FULL  STORY]

Former Tainan County Council speaker was on the run for 4 years

Taiwan News
Date: 2019/01/17
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – Former Tainan County Council Speaker Wu Chien-pao (吳健保) has been arrested in the Philippines after four years on the run for a prison sentence in a baseball game-fixing scandal.

Wu was sentenced to five years and five months in jail, of which three years and two months effective, in 2014 for threatening baseball players to lose games according to his instructions, the Central News Agency reported. The scandal was one of the largest ever to hit Taiwanese baseball, involving more than 20 people, including star players like Chen Chih-yuan and Chang Chih-chia.

Wu was scheduled to enter prison in September 2014, but he disappeared without a trace, until police and immigration agents arrested him as he arrived at a villa in Subic Bay Wednesday.

Taiwanese investigators reportedly located him several months ago, asking police in the Philippines to observe him. He was seen frequenting casinos during that period, according to CNA.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2019/01/17
By: Wang Shu-fen and Evelyn Kao 

Taipei, Jan. 17 (CNA) Temperatures on Jade Mountain dropped Thursday to the lowest so far this winter but there was no snow, which has set a record for the latest snow in Taiwan in 11 years, the Central Weather Bureau (CWB) said.

At 4:24 a.m., the mercury on Jade Mountain, Taiwan’s highest peak, fell to minus 1.2 degrees Celsius but there was not enough moisture to create the right conditions for snow, according to the CWB.

Not since 2008 has the winter’s first snowfall been delayed so late in Taiwan, the CWB said.

That year, the first snow of the season fell Jan. 17 on Jade Mountain, which stands 3,952 meters above sea level, the CWB said.    [FULL  STORY]