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Cancer-fighting ‘guided missile’ created by team

VERSATILE: While other peptides focus on a single type of cancer, the team’s new technology could be used to target at least 11, Chang Gung University’s John Yu said

Taipei Times
Date: Apr 23, 2020
By: Lin Chia-nan / Staff reporter

A team of researchers has developed cancer-targeting peptides that could be used as “guided missiles” to treat various cancers and cancer stem cells without harming normal cells.

The research team last year won the National Innovation Award for its Fn cancer-targeting peptide technology, Chang Gung University Institute of Stem Cell and Translational Cancer Research director John Yu (游正博) told a news conference at the Ministry of Science and Technology in Taipei yesterday.

The team used computer-aided methods and novel scoring algorithms to design cancer-targeting peptides, which can guide various types of therapeutics to cancer cells, said Yu, an expert on stem cells and regenerative medicine.

Some cancer drugs are inefficient and cause painful side effects, because they cannot precisely target cancer cells, he said.    [FULL  STORY]

229 Taiwanese return from Hubei in second special flight this week

Focus Taiwan
Date: 04/21/2020
By: Shen Peng-ta and Joseph Yeh

Taipei, April 21 (CNA) A total of 229 Taiwan nationals, previously stranded in China's Hubei province due to the COVID-19 outbreak, returned to the country on a special flight late Tuesday and were immediately placed in quarantine.

The government-contracted China Airlines (CAL) flight departed Shanghai's Pudong International Airport around 7:30 p.m. and arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport at 9:11 p.m.

Upon arrival, the 229 Taiwan nationals, 175 adults and 54 children, according to the Border Control Corps, received a health check at a provisional facility at the airport and were sent to a designated quarantine site, where they will serve their two-week quarantine period.

Before the plane took-off from Shanghai, four Taiwanese who were originally scheduled to take the flight were found holding expired travel documents and unable to leave China, according to the Taipei-based Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) which arranged the flight.    [FULL  STORY]

Puyuma driver tried to stop train in last second

DECODED: The driver tried to boost the train’s power by speeding up and slowing down repeatedly after it experienced intermittent power output, a report said

Taipei Times
Date: Apr 22, 2020
By: Shelley Shan / Staff reporter

Taiwan Transportation Safety Board member Li Kang speaks at a news conference in Taipei yesterday.
Photo: Liao Chen-huei, Taipei Times

The Taiwan Transportation Safety Board yesterday released a report on the deadly Puyuma Express derailment on Oct. 21, 2018, showing that the train was traveling at 140kph when it entered a curve ahead of Yilan County’s Sinma (新馬) Railway Station, adding that the driver tried to decelerate the train only one second before it derailed.

Eighteen people were killed in the accident and 291 were injured.

The Executive Yuan’s investigation report published on Dec. 21, 2018, failed to appease the relatives of the deceased, who accused the Taiwan Railways Administration of putting the blame solely on the driver.

The agency reached settlements with the families of only two of the deceased, as well as the injured passengers.

The driver of Puyuma Express No. 6432 did not plead guilty. He said he was operating the train within the speed limit and that he had informed the agency that he had turned off the automatic train protection (ATP) system, which was designed to automatically slow down the train when it exceeded the speed limit.    [FULL  STORY]

Warning texts sent to 200,000 people connected to navy ship outbreak

Radio Taiwan International
Date: 20 April, 2020
By: Andrew Ryan

Global Mall in Pingtung County, southern Taiwan is disinfected and closed for the day after a member of the navy visited prior to testing positive for COVID-19. (CNA photo)

Officials have sent warning text messages to some 200,000 people who may have come in contact with one of the 24 people infected during a navy friendship mission to Palau. Those two dozen cases were announced over the weekend; all of the cases were on board the Panshi Fast Combat Support Ship, one of three ships in the fleet. 

Officials have tracked the movements of the 24 people infected with COVID-19. They visited nine counties and cities throughout Taiwan before they were confirmed to have the virus.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan preparing reception of M1A2T Abrams MBTs deliveries

Army Recognition
Date: 20 April 2020 

Taiwanese M1A2T Abrams will be based on the M1A2 SEPv2 Abrams (Picture source: Army Recognition)

Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense is preparing to train personnel and set up training facilities for the 108 M1A2T Abrams tanks to be received in four batches from the U.S. from 2023 to 2026, the sale having been approved in July 2019 for a budget of US$ 1.34 billion according to Taiwan's Central News Agency (CNA).

Taiwanese M1A2T Abrams will be based on the M1A2 SEPv2 Abrams (Picture source: Army Recognition)

The Taiwanese Army began preparing early this year for the eventual arrival of the tanks, including training instructors, setting up training grounds and bunkers, and purchasing simulators. The preparations are reportedly being made with the help of U.S. experts, who visited Taiwan last February. Taiwan purchased the 108 M1A2T tanks to modernize its current fleet of 1,000 battle tanks, mostly M60A3 and CM-11 models that have been in service for more than two decades. The M1A2T is a customized model of the M1A2 SEPv2, specifically for Taiwanese Army requirements. The M1A2 SEP (System Enhancement Package) version of the Abrams tank features a new-production turret with a series of enhancements for enhanced survivability.

On top of U.S.-made simulators bought with the tanks, the National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology (NCSIST), Taiwan's state-owned institution in charge of developing indigenous weapon systems, will also develop Taiwan's own simulators and install other training facilities at military camps where the tanks will be deployed.    [FULL  STORY]

CAL, union agree on 15-25% pay cuts for employees at all levels

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/04/20
By:  Central News Agency

(Wikipedia photo)

State-controlled China Airlines (CAL) has reached an agreement with its employees to impose temporary pay cuts at all levels, with reductions ranging between 15 and 25 percent.

All rank and file workers will have their pay cut by 15 percent while mid-level managers and top executives will see pay cuts of 20 percent and 25 percent, respectively, China Airlines Employees' Union president Liu Hui-tsung (劉惠宗) said Monday after labor-management talks.

The reductions will take effect on May 1 and last until July 31, and CAL will operate on reduced timetables during that period, with employees taking an additional four or five days off per month beyond their normal rotations, Liu said.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan embassy in Palau to be tested for COVID-19

Focus Taiwan
Date: 04/20/2020
By: Yeh Su-ping, Matt Yu, Wang Yang-yu and Joseph Yeh

CNA file photo for illustrative purposes only

Taipei, April 20 (CNA) The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) on Monday said it will screen staff at the nation's embassy in Palau for COVID-19 after they received a Taiwan naval fleet that visited the Pacific ally last month, in the wake of 24 crew members testing positive for coronavirus.

Baushuan Ger (葛葆萱), head of MOFA's Department of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, said so far all members of the ROC Embassy in Palau are in good health and none have developed suspected COVID-19 symptoms.

However, the ministry will arrange screenings for them later Monday and Tuesday to check if they have contracted the disease, Ger told a lawmaker during a legislative session Monday.

Ger also said the Palau government has been made fully aware of the cluster infection on board a Taiwanese naval vessel and the Pacific island is now considering expanding its COVID-19 screenings.
[FULL  STORY]

Lawmaker reveals three passport design proposals

SHARING IDEAS: Using other countries as examples, the DPP’s Chung Chia-pin said that the nation’s name did not have to be written in English on the cover of the passport

Taipei Times
Date: Apr 21, 2020
By: Lu Yi-hsuan and William Hetherington / Staff reporter, with staff writer

Workers disinfect Taipei Main Station on Monday. (CNA photo)

Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chung Chia-pin (鍾佳濱) yesterday unveiled three design proposals for a revised passport cover, at a meeting of the Legislative Yuan’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee in Taipei.

The proposals were in response to a debate about whether to emphasize “Taiwan” and de-emphasize “China” in the wording on the cover.

Chung proposed designs including one with no English wording at all, which keeps the overall design of the current passport.

Another replaced the national emblem with a map of the main island of Taiwan, and had the words “Taiwan Passport” in large lettering at the top and “Republic of China” in smaller lettering at the bottom, both in Chinese and English.    [FULL  STORY]

Film review: ‘Tigertail’ is deeply touching, but fails to achieve narrative brilliance

Arab News
Date: April 19, 2020
By: Gautaman Bhaskara

The movie opens in the rice fields of Taiwan where we see a boy who has been sent by his single mother to live with his grandparents. (Supplied)

CHENNAI: Many films on immigrants focus on their plight in the new land, but Alan Yang’s new offering on Netflix, “Tigertail,” though inspired by his own father’s story who migrated from Taiwan to the US, has much more to say about the protagonist’s relationship with four women in his life — his mother, his former girlfriend in Taiwan, his wife in the US and his daughter. While Pin-Jui (Tzi Ma in his middle age, Hong-Chi Lee as a young man and Zhi-Hao Yang as a boy) shares an extremely warm bond with his mother and his former girlfriend, his relationship with his wife and daughter is strained. 

“Tigertail” is inspired by the filmmaker’s own father’s story who migrated from Taiwan to the US. (Supplied)

The movie opens in the rice fields of Taiwan where we see a boy who has been sent by his single mother to live with his grandparents. Later, Pin-Jui relocates to a town to work along with his mother, who is a factory-hand. Torn between his dream to migrate to the US and better his dreary prospects, he gives up his girlfriend to marry the factory owner’s daughter who gives them tickets to America. Although he finally finds financial success, his personal life falls into a rut. Divorced and lonely, his only child, daughter Angela (Christine Ko), does not keep in touch with him.

Yang — known as the producer-writer behind the brilliant “Parks and Recreation,” “Master of None” and “Little America” — splendidly juxtaposes the present with the past and by keeping the plot simple, confusion is avoided. Some of the most impressive scenes are Pin-Jui’s days with his first love, Yuan (Yo-Hsing). Later, Pin-Jui as an older, grumpy and distraught man, finds it hard to break the ice with Angela, and some of the touching snapshots come in the scenes between the two, but Ko is too wooden to leave a mark.    [FULL  STORY]

How Taiwan has confounded predictions in fending off the worst of Covid-19

‘I think we were the front-runner of alertness’

Irish Times
Date: April 19,m 2020
By: Shane Stokes

A young girl and her grandfather play at a park in Taipei on April 6th, 2020. Photograph: Sam Yeh/AFP

In the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic, researchers at John Hopkins University predicted that Taiwan would be one of the countries most affected by the virus. It is located just 130km from China, saw more than 400,000 of its 24 million citizens working there last year, and had almost three million Chinese visitors in 2019.

However, Taiwan has defied those expectations.

By the middle of April, Taiwan had still only reported 400 Covid-19 cases, most of which were imported. And just six deaths.

So what did Taiwan do so correctly? Prof Peter Chang is one of the most experienced doctors in Taiwan. Harvard-educated, he was a visiting scientist at the National Institutes of Health, a professor at Taipei Medical University and Kaohsiung Medical University, senior medical advisor to the National Taipei Hospital and now adjunct professor in Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston. He has been an adviser to the ministry of health and has been a health diplomat for the World Health Organisation and the European Union. He also serves as an ombudsman in Taiwan.   [FULL  STORY]