Week 7 -Chang Guann oil

Taiwan’s ‘Gutter Oil’ Scandal

By THE EDITORIAL BOARD

SEPT. 18, 2014

Since Sept. 4, the Taiwanese authorities have been struggling to control a food scare caused by 645 tons of adulterated cooking oil produced by the Chang Guann Company and distributed to more than 1,200 restaurants, schools and food processors. As of Monday, health authorities had identified a wide array of more than 1,300 food products tainted by the oil, including instant noodles, snacks, cakes, dumplings, bread, canned pork, meat paste and glutinous rice. Taiwan obviously needs a stronger food-safety policy with meaningful penalties.

Chang Guann has been buying what’s known as “gutter oil” — recycled oil from restaurant waste and animal byproducts — from an illegal factory and mixing it with lard to make its Chuan Tung cooking oil. Though the illegal factory had been in business for more than a decade, the authorities had failed to detect what it was up to. Chang Guann had also managed to delude inspectors. Recycled gutter oil can contain carcinogens. No case of illness has been reported so far. Chang Guann was fined a trifling $1.67 million for its illegal sales.

The investigation also revealed that Chang Guann had been importing lard from Hong Kong that was intended for industrial purposes but falsely listed by the Hong Kong company as fit for human consumption.

The Ministry of Health and Welfare is now working to set up a system to monitor about 100 oil manufacturers and 500 importers in Taiwan, requiring them to register information about their products. Submitting fraudulent information could lead to a maximum fine of $100,000 and suspension of business for one year.

The scare follows a series of other food scandals last year; in one case, a factory owner was sentenced to 16 years in prison for adding a banned coloring agent, copper chlorophyllin, to olive oil. The Taiwanese authorities need to be doing more than reacting to food-safety problems on an ad hoc basis to ensure that what people eat is safe.

 http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/19/opinion/taiwans-gutter-oil-scandal.html?_r=0

Structure of the Lead：

        WHO- the Taiwanese authorities

   WHEN- Sept. 4

 WHAT- have been struggling to control a food scare caused by 645 tons of adulterated cooking oil produced by the Chang Guann Company and distributed to more than 1,200 restaurants, schools and food processors. 

  WHY- As of Monday, health authorities had identified a wide array of more than 1,300 food products tainted by the oil, including instant noodles, snacks, cakes, dumplings, bread, canned pork, meat paste and glutinous rice.

  WHERE-not given

  HOW-not given

Keywords：

   1. Gutter oil：地溝油

   2. adulterated ：摻假

   3. food-safety ：食品安全

   4. waste：廢棄物

   5. lard：豬油

   6. delude ：騙

   7. carcinogens ：致癌物

   8. scare ：恐慌

       9. copper chlorophyllin：葉綠素銅

  10. olive oil ：橄欖油

Week 6 - Japan Mount Ontake Eruption

More than 30 believed dead in Japanese eruption

AP, TOKYO

Mon, Sep 29, 2014

Rescue workers have found 30 or more people unconscious and thought to be dead near the peak of an erupting volcano in central Japan, local government and police said yesterday.

Nagano Prefecture posted on its Web site that about 30 people had heart and lung failure, the customary way for Japanese authorities to describe a body until police physicians can examine it. At least four people were being brought down from 3,067m Mount Ontake yesterday afternoon, a day after it began erupting.

A Nagano police official numbered unconscious people at more than 30. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly.

Mount Ontake, about 210km west of Tokyo, began erupting shortly before noon on Saturday, spewing large white plumes of gas and ash high into the sky and blanketing the surrounding area in ash. The mountain is a popular climbing destination and at least 250 people were initially trapped on the slopes, though most made their way down by Saturday night.

Before the unconscious victims were found, Japan’s Fire and Disaster Management Agency said that 45 people had been reported missing. The exact location of the people and their identities were not immediately known.

Rescue workers were also trying to help injured people and others who had been stranded on the mountain overnight, many taking refuge in mountain lodges. Some were unable to descend on their own, or unwilling to take the risk.

Seven people were picked up in three helicopter trips, Japanese Ministry of Defense official Toshihiko Muraki said. All are conscious and can walk, though details of their conditions were unclear, he said.

Japanese television footage showed a soldier descending from a helicopter to an ash-covered slope, helping latch on a man and then the two of them being pulled up.

Japan’s Self-Defense Force has deployed seven helicopters and 250 troops. Police and fire departments are also taking part in the rescue effort.

Shinichi Shimohara, who works at a shrine at the foot of the mountain, said he was on his way up on Saturday morning when he heard a loud noise that sounded like strong winds followed by “thunder” as the volcano erupted.

“For a while, I heard thunder pounding a number of times,” he said. “Soon after, some climbers started descending. They were all covered with ash, completely white. I thought to myself, this must be really serious.”

The volcano’s most recent major eruption was in 1979.

 http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2014/09/29/2003600819

Structure of the Lead：

        WHO- local government and police

   WHEN- yesterday

   WHAT- Rescue workers have found 30 or more people unconscious and thought to be dead near the peak of an erupting volcano

   WHY- an erupting volcano

   WHERE- central Japan

   HOW-not given

Keywords：

   1. unconscious：昏迷

   2. eruption：爆發

   3. volcano：火山

   4. anonymity ：匿名

   5. spew：噴湧

   6. trapped：被困

   7. refuge ：避難所

   8. helicopter：直昇機

   9. thunder：雷聲

 10. descend：降

Week 5- Ebola

Elaborate Ebola claims all lies: CDC

Staff writer, with CAN

Sun, Dec 07, 2014

A suspected Ebola case reported to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) appears to be a hoax after a test on a young man hospitalized on Friday came back negative, a health official said yesterday.

The 19-year-old student now faces a fine of between NT$10,000 and NT$150,000 under the Communicable Disease Control Act (傳染病防治法), which requires people to provide factual information about communicable diseases.

CDC Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥) said that the test was negative after samples were rushed to a lab in Taipei early in the morning.

The young man’s story about traveling in Africa and eating bat meat are now believed to have been entirely made up.

Chuang said earlier that a search based on the personal information provided by the man yielded no record of him ever leaving Taiwan, despite claims that he had recently been to Nigeria. It turns out that he does not even have a passport, Chuang added.

The claim was also suspicious because Nigeria was declared Ebola-free in October, even as other west African nations continue to battle the spread of the virus.

It was not immediately clear why the young man had given false information to doctors at Kaohsiung Veterans General Hospital, where he was admitted late on Friday.

If the test results had come back positive, the man would have been the nation’s first Ebola case.

The student, who is said to have taken an extended leave from school, has shown no symptoms since being hospitalized and has given contradictory accounts of his condition and purported travels, Chuang said.

The man complained of a fever and other symptoms such as vomiting and diarrhea, the hospital said.

Even though the man had not traveled to the three West African nations still listed as having ongoing Ebola outbreaks, the hospital reported the suspected case to the CDC at about midnight on Friday after careful evaluation, Kaohsiung Department of Health official Tsai Wu-hsiung (蔡武雄) said.

As a precaution, the patient had been placed in a negative pressure isolation ward, officials said.

 http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2014/12/07/2003606151

Structure of the Lead：

   WHO-a health official

   WHEN-yesterday

   WHAT-A suspected Ebola case reported to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) appears to be a hoax 

   WHY-after a test on a young man hospitalized on Friday came back negative

   WHERE-not given

   HOW-not given

Keywords：

   1. Ebola ：伊波拉

   2. hoax ：惡作劇

   3. fine ：罰款

   4. negative ：陰性

   5. bat ：蝙蝠

   6.suspicious ：可疑的

   7.symptoms ：症狀

   8.vomiting ：嘔吐

   9.diarrhea：腹瀉

   10.negative pressure isolation ward：負壓隔離病房