Taipei Times
Date: Mar 11, 2019
By: Chou Min-hung, Wu Liang-yi and William Hetherington  /  Staff reporters, with staff writer

A temple worker in Taoyuan has been indicted after an autopsy found that herbal medicine she sold to a temple patron last year caused the patron’s death.

A betel nut saleswoman surnamed Lai (賴), 28, was left with red blotches on her cheeks after undergoing cosmetic surgery.

She was visiting a temple in the city’s Dayuan District (大園) on June 30 last year when a woman surnamed Chiu (邱), 51, who was selling herbal medicine at a stall inside the temple, noticed her red cheeks and called out to her.

Chiu allegedly told Lai that her cheeks were a symptom of “toxicity” in her body and that she could detoxify herself by consuming two teaspoons daily of ground Chinese staff vine, or Celastrus angulatus, the indictment said.

Chiu sold the herbal medicine to Lai for NT$1,000, which she took every day a    [FULL  STORY]