Focus Taiwan
Date: 06/25/2020
By: Matt Yu and Emerson Lim

Taipei, June 25 (CNA) Three American military aircraft were seen Thursday flying over the Bashi Channel, a strategic waterway south of Taiwan that is used by Chinese submarines sailing from Hainan Province into the Pacific.

Images posted on Twitter by aircraft trackers Golf9 and the South China Sea Probing Initiative (SCSPI) showed two United States reconnaissance aircraft and a transport plane over the Bashi Channel on Thursday morning.

Shih Shun-wen (史順文), spokesman for Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense (MND), declined to comment on the appearance of the U.S. military planes, saying only that the ministry is fully aware of any movements by foreign military around Taiwan.

According to Golf9, an American RC-135U Combat Sent reconnaissance aircraft departed Kadena Air Base in Japan Thursday morning, flying past Taiwan's southeastern coast and heading out over the South China Sea.    [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date: Jun 26, 2020
By Jake Chung / Staff writer, with CNA

Academia Sinica’s Chen Ding-shinn (陳定信), the nation’s leading authority on hepatitis, died

from pancreatic cancer at National Taiwan University Hospital on Wednesday. He was 76.

Born on July 6, 1943, in then-Taipei County’s Yingge Township (鶯歌), Chen was a student of National Taiwan University College of Medicine professor Sung Juei-low (宋瑞樓), dubbed the Taiwanese father of liver disease research.

Chen attributed his dedication to the study of liver diseases to his father dying of liver cancer when he was in his senior year in college and to his contracting hepatitis A when he was in elementary school.

He was in the original group that persuaded the government to introduce hepatitis B preventive measures, leading to the government’s introduction of a mass vaccination program in 1984, the first nation in the world to do so.    [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 24 June, 2020
By: John Van Trieste

Taiwan’s envoy to Canada has shared Taiwan’s experience fighting COVID-19 during a meeting of the Canadian House of Commons’ health committee. This is only the second time a Taiwanese official has been invited to give testimony in the Canadian Parliament in the 50 years since Canada cut formal ties with Taiwan.

Representative Winston Wen-Yi Chen attended Tuesday’s meeting virtually.

Chen said that Taiwan is neither a WHO member nor an observer, and that it has no timely access to key information about global health. However, he said that Taiwan has still managed to fight off COVID-19.

He said this success stems from the lessons Taiwan had to take away from the 2003 SARS outbreak. He said that Taiwan prepared itself for a future epidemic as a result. In addition, he said that Taiwan’s government took quick, decisive action upon learning of the outbreak of pneumonia in Wuhan. Chen said Taiwan began screening arriving passengers on the last day of 2019, over three weeks before Wuhan was put into lockdown.    [FULL  STORY]

Koaku.com
Date: June 24, 2020
By: Luke Plunkett

We first wrote about Taiwanese grandpa Chen San-yuan back in 2018, when he was spotted with 11 phones strapped to his bike so he could play Pokémon Go. In the two years since, he has upped his game considerably.

As The Verge report, Chen’s bike+ phone assemblage has slowly got more precarious, from 45 phones last year to 64 following his most recent evolution, which was spotted locally earlier this week.

64 phones! And this just for a dude who is playing to “catch and upgrade rare Pokémon”, and who hardly ever takes part in battles or raids!

I have no idea how he actually gets around on that thing, but if there was a way to turn all of the phone’s cameras on at once and ride it through the viewfinder footage, that would be incredible.    [FULL  STORY]

Little-understood v6irus infects avian species, believed to be capable of spreading to humans

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/06/24
By: Huang Tzu-ti, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The Tembusu virus, a mosquito-borne virus that could be transmitted to humans, has been reported in Taiwan for the first time, according to the Animal Health Research Institute (AHRI).

The virus was first detected at a duck farm in December last year during a government investigation into reduced egg production, said AHRI Director Chiu Chui-chang (邱垂章).

According to the official, the waterfowl at the farm had been laying eggs at an unsatisfactory rate, but they had not been found to have contracted any known disease. It took genome sequence mapping to identify the virus in the birds, wrote CNA.

In 2010, the Tembusu virus was identified as the culprit behind an outbreak at a number of duck farms in eastern China that reported a drop in egg production. Symptoms include anorexia, diarrhea, rhinorrhea, and paralysis.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 06/24/2020
By: Liang Pei-chi and intern Melissa Wu

Taipei, June 24 (CNA) The Ximen Metro Plaza will become a non-smoking area starting July 1, and violators will be fined after a month-long grace period, Taipei's Department of Environmental Protection announced Wednesday.

Violators of the non-smoking policy will only be warned during the month of July, but will be fined between NT$2,000 (US$67) to NT$10,000 starting in August, the department said.

Throwing cigarette butts on the ground will also be punishable by fines ranging from NT$1,200 to NT$6,000, the department said.

The plaza, which covers the area west of the Ximen metro station between exits 1 and 6, serves as a gateway into one of Taipei's most popular shopping and entertainment areas.
[FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date: Jun 25, 2020 page2
By: Shelley Shan / Staff reporter, in Taitung Country

The Ministry of Transportation and Communications is planning to expand a local carpooling program in Taitung County after it proved effective in meeting the needs of residents in some of the nation’s more remote areas.

Minister of Transportation and Communications Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) made the announcement after inspecting a carpooling service in Yanping Township (延平).

Before the service was launched on a trial basis about two years ago, it would take students nearly two hours to reach school, including a 40 minute walk to the bus stop, the ministry said, adding that older people would carry small stools with them, as it often took them one to two hours to walk to the nearest bus stop.

The government used to believe that the transportation issue in remote areas could be solved by providing a public bus system, Lin said.    [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 23 June, 2020
By: Natalie Tso

Taiwan is promoting its domestic tourism sites this summer. Not only will there be subsidies for citizens, but the tourism bureau has also highlighted 130 barrier-free travel destinations in its 13 national parks.

Taiwan is promoting its barrier-free travel destinations.  These places are easy to get around for people with various physical conditions.  There are ramps for wheelchairs to board boats, shuttles and buses.

The head of The League for Persons with Disabilities, Liu Jin-tsung, said that in the past, they were the ones that watched the cars while family and friends enjoyed the scenery. That’s because there were so many barriers.    [FULL  STORY]

Specially priced admission to Nantou's Aowanda National Forest Recreation Area only lasts from July 1 to 5

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/06/23
By: George Liao, Taiwan News, Staff Writer\

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The Nantou Forest District Office is offering NT$10 (US$0.33) for admission to the Aowanda National Forest Recreation Area (奧萬大國家森林遊樂區) from July 1 to 5 to celebrate the 26th anniversary of the park.

The original prices are NT$200 per adult on weekends and holidays and NT$150 per adult on weekdays.

Located amongst mid-altitude mountains, Aowanda is blessed with a rich ecology and various seasonal attractions to admire, such as cherry blossoms in spring, waterfalls during summer, bright moonlight rays in the fall, and maple trees in the wintertime, according to Nantou Forest District Office Director Lee Zheng-xian (李政賢).

Aowanda is ideal for hiking as its forests and waterfalls provide health-enhancing phytoncides and negative ions, Lee said. According to a brief Taiwan Tourism Bureau description of the park, "the scenery is tranquil and peaceful.”   [FULL  STORY]