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Jenn Lann Temple chairman Yen Ching-piao, front center, takes part in a prayer ceremony in an undated photograph.Photo: Chiu Yi-chin, Taipei Times
The Dajia Matsu Pilgrimage (大甲媽祖遶境), the largest annual religious procession in Taiwan, is to go ahead as planned, its organizer said yesterday, despite calls by Central Epidemic Command Center officials for the event to be postponed amid concerns over the spread of COVID-19.

The procession, which starts in Taichung’s Dajia District (大甲), is held yearly to celebrate the birthday of the sea goddess Matsu, with the Matsu statue from Jenn Lann Temple (鎮瀾宮) carried on a palanquin through central Taiwan over nine days.

Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims gather along the more than 340km route from Taichung to Changhua, Yunlin and Chiayi counties to celebrate the occasion and receive blessings from the goddess.

However, as the outbreak worldwide shows no signs of abating, there have been concerns that a religious gathering of such scale could spark an outbreak in Taiwan, especially as cluster infections linked to churches have been reported in South Korea and Singapore.

After discussing the issue with temples in central Taiwan, Jenn Lann Temple chairman Yen Ching-piao (顏清標) yesterday said that unless the central government orders otherwise, the procession would be held as scheduled from March 19 to March 28.

However, several prominent events that are part of the celebration would be canceled, Yen said, including an outdoor banquet that more than 10,000 people attended last year, a concert and a ceremony at Fengtien Temple (奉天宮) in Chiayi County.

The central government has yet to provide any specific guidance on the pilgrimage.

Deputy Minister of the Interior Chen Tsung-yen (陳宗彥) would only say that the Ministry of the Interior believes that large religious events should be carefully assessed, and that organizers should have backup plans ready if an event needs to be postponed.

Regarding the Dajia Matsu Pilgrimage, Chen said that the ministry has communicated with temple officials, who have proposed alternatives to certain aspects of the procession, including how they would carry the palanquin.

Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who heads the center, took a sentimental approach on the pilgrimage, calling Matsu’s followers to safeguard their own health and not “worry” the goddess.

The COVID-19 situation is “very disadvantageous” for large events, he said, adding that the unpredictability of the coronavirus has made it a significant threat that is unlikely to be contained in the short term.

Despite conceding that the center must be cautious when making a decision about the time-honored religious event, Chen Shih-chung told a news conference at the center in Taipei: “I would like to make a call regarding religious events. Matsu is benevolent. People should take care of themselves and one another during the epidemic, and not worry Matsu.”

The COVID-19 situation must not be taken lightly, so if everyone’s minds are set on helping and benefiting one another, they would be willing to accept the outcome, he said, without elaborating on the “outcome.”

The Special Act on COVID-19 Prevention, Relief and Restoration (嚴重特殊傳染性肺炎防治及紓困振興特別條例), which was passed on Tuesday, gives the head of the center the right to take any response measures necessary to contain the disease.

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people: 陳時中 陳宗彥 顏清標

title: Virus Outbreak: Dajia Matsu Pilgrimage going ahead


title: Nanya to increase spending by 67%

content_text:
Nanya to increase spending by 67%

COST OF BUSINESS:Nanya’s planned NT$9.2 billion in capital spending comes as UMC’s board approved a NT$20.84 billion plan, mainly to expand its Xiamen fab
Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) yesterday raised its capital spending by about 67 percent for this year to NT$9.2 billion (US$302.8 million) as the DRAM chipmaker aims to focus on 20-nanometer (nm) capacity expansion and 10nm-class technology development.

The company’s board of directors yesterday approved the capital spending budget.

Nanya Technology last year capped its capital spending at NT$5.5 billion to cope with an industry-wide supply glut.

Last month, it said that it could save significantly by developing its own advanced technology, rather than licensing it from long-term partner Micron Technology Inc.

The company also aims to increase productivity by 30 percent by migrating to 10nm-class technology, from 20nm, which would lower manufacturing costs.

It is scheduled to start pilot production of the new chips in the second half of this year.

Nanya Technology initially plans to use the next-generation technology to produce 8GB low-power DDR4 and high-density DDR5 chips used in consumer electronics, smartphones, laptops and PCs, it said.

The board of directors approved a cash dividend distribution of NT$1.5 per share, representing a payout ratio of 46.58 percent, based on last year’s earnings per share of NT$3.22.

The board also approved NT$800 million in employee bonuses and compensation.

Those proposals are subject to shareholder approval during an annual general meeting on May 28.

Separately, contract chipmaker United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電) yesterday said that its board of directors approved a cash dividend of NT$0.75 per common share, its highest in nine years.

The distribution represents a payout ratio of 91.46 percent, compared with last year’s earnings per share of NT$0.92.

UMC’s board also approved NT$20.84 billion in capital spending for this year, mainly for 28nm capacity expansion at its 12-inch fab in Xiamen, China.

The board directors also approved the issuance of 233 million restricted shares for employees and NT$1.13 billion in employee bonuses and compensation.

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people: 侯友宜 黃偉哲

content_text:
Virus Outbreak: Tainan cancels its marathon as New Taipei presses on

Tainan Mayor Huang Wei-che, front right, helps release a rare black-faced spoonbill into the wild in a coastal wetland area yesterday.Photo: Yang Chin-cheng, Taipei Times
[Editor’s Note: After press time last night, the New Taipei City Government announced it was canceling its marathon.]

Tainan Mayor Huang Wei-che (黃偉哲) yesterday announced that the Tainan Half Marathon scheduled to be held on Sunday would be postponed until October, while the New Taipei City Government said that this year’s New Taipei City Wan Jin Shih Marathon would continue as planned.

Huang’s announcement came only one day after Tainan City Government officials told a media conference what they would do to prevent the spread of COVID-19 at the sports event.

The Taiwan Medical Alliance for Labor Justice and Patient Safety had urged New Taipei City and Tainan to cancel next month’s marathons.

“We have received comments from many people who urged to city to cancel the event, fearing that it would become a loophole in the nation’s disease-prevention efforts,” Huang said, adding that one of Italy’s confirmed COVID-19 patients reportedly ran in a marathon.

“After consulting medical professionals, we have decided to postpone the event,” he said.

Tainan Bureau of Education Director Cheng Hsin-hui (鄭新輝) said that more than 14,000 people were expected to participate in the half marathon.

The city cannot guarantee that runners would not contract the disease at the event, he said.

If one of the runners was confirmed to have contracted COVID-19, it would impose a tremendous burden on disease-prevention officials, he added.

As such, the city decided to postpone the event to the middle of October, Cheng said, adding that it was a painful decision and that he hoped all runners would understand and cooperate with efforts to prevent the spread of the disease.

People who still plan to take part in the half marathon in October are advised to keep their runner’s bibs and monitor updated information on the event’s Web site, the Tainan Department of Sports said.

On the other hand, the New Taipei City Government said that the city’s Wan Jin Shi Marathon would be held on March 15 as scheduled.

The marathon, which has been certified as a silver-label road race by World Athletics, has over the past several years become one of the biggest sporting events in northern Taiwan, attracting runners from around the world.

About 11,000 runners are expected to participate in the event, which has a full marathon group and a 10K challenger group, New Taipei City Sports Office Director Hung Yu-ling (洪玉玲) said.

Following instructions from the Central Epidemic Command Center, Hung said that the city has disqualified 206 runners from China, South Korea, Hong Kong and Macau, adding that it would adjust the qualifications of runners from other countries based on the center’s instructions.

Participants who have applied to run in next year’s marathon instead due to concern over COVID-19 would not have to pay registration fees again, she said.

About 6,000 runners are to compete in the race next month, the office said, adding that there would not be an opening ceremony, a warm-up session or meal service on the day of the race.

The space where runners are to gather would be larger and shuttle buses to pick up runners who finish the race would set out earlier than scheduled, it said.

New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) said that the race does not have to be canceled if runners can start one group at a time and avoid massing into a large crowd.


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Virus Outbreak: Three questioned, face charges for spreading rumors

‘NO JOKING’:Premier Su Tseng-chang warned the public about spreading fake information and urged people to report and not disseminate them
Pingtung County Commissioner Pan Meng-an gestures in a graphic posted on his Facebook timeline stating that there are as yet no confirmed COVID-19 cases in the county, contrary to a rumor posted on the Internet.Image grab from Pan Meng-an’s Facebook timeline
Police have questioned a woman who disseminated a video of bats nesting in roofs, as well as the leaders of a fringe political party who said that a COVID-19 outbreak would kill half of Taiwan’s population, as authorities cracked down on people who spread misinformation about the disease.

A 68-year-old woman living in Nantou County has been allegedly identified as the source of two pieces of fabricated news that has been circulating online, the Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB) said yesterday.

The video the woman shared showed bats hidden under roof tiles and flying away when disturbed, under which she wrote: “Found: The source of the Wuhan virus. Every house in Wuhan, Hubei [Province], has bats living inside roof tiles. Scary.”

The video was originally uploaded to the Internet in July 2011 and shows roof repair work on a bat-infested house in the US, and was titled: “Bat infestation under tile roof — Roofing Miami, Florida,” according to fact-checking Web sites.

The woman had earlier posted a message saying that the clouds coming from China’s Chongqing and Hubei Province carried the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 and urged people to seek shelter from the rain, CIB officer Hsu Yi-hsiang (許益祥) said.

Wang Chia-cheng (王家蓁), director of Aerosol Science Research Center at National Chung Shan University, has dismissed the rumor, saying: “The virus is mainly transmitted through human-to-human contact and through droplet infection. Aerosol transmission of the virus would only be possible in closed or semi-closed spaces.”

CIB officials also questioned Chinese Chung Cheng Party Chairman Hsu Hao-cheng (徐浩城), 67, and party secretary-general Lee Mei-hua (李美華) for claiming that the illness was caused by spiritual dysfunction and half of Taiwan’s population would die from it.

The message also claimed that Hsu is a god that “has come to save humanity. He is the savior of the world.”

A post on the party’s Facebook page said that it was useless to wear a mask, wash hands or wear protective clothing to prevent an infection, urging people to instead “listen to Chairman Hsu singing, which can attune a person’s magnetic field.”

The three would face charges of breaching the Communicable Disease Control Act (傳染病防治法) and the Social Order Maintenance Act (社會秩序維護法) for spreading misinformation, the CIB said.

Police were also investigating a person who wrote on social media that the Pingtung Sports Stadium in Pingtung City was being transformed into a makeshift hospital to treat COVID-19 patients and that there were at least 700 confirmed cases in southern Taiwan.

“In recent days fake information has been circulating online about the virus situation, which have outrageous and unreasonable content,” Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) posted on Facebook yesterday. “The use of words suggests they were not written by Taiwanese, so I ask everyone to report them and do not disseminate them any further.”

“We have passed the Special Act on COVID-19 Prevention, Relief and Restoration (嚴重特殊傳染性肺炎防治及紓困振興特別條例), which states that people found guilty of spreading fake news about the virus could face up to three years in prison and a NT$3 million [US$98,739] fine, so do not try to make jokes about it,” Su wrote.

In related news, Taipei police said that a 37-year-old woman, surnamed Wang (王), is facing charges for falsely claiming that a coworker at a hostess bar in Taipei’s Wanhua District (萬華) was confirmed to have been infected with COVID-19.

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people: 蔡英文 柯文哲

title: Virus Outbreak: Tsai halts preparations for her inauguration

content_text:
By Su Yung-yao
and William Hetherington / Staff reporter, with staff writer
President Tsai Ing-wen announces that she has signed into law the Special Act on COVID-19 Prevention, Relief and Restoration at the Presidential Office in Taipei on Tuesday.Photo: Wang Yi-sung, Taipei Times
President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday announced that she had suspended preparations for her inauguration ceremony, saying that she would not hold a large assembly amid fears of COVID-19 contagion.

Any further plans regarding the inauguration would be made according to suggestions offered by the Central Epidemic Command Center, she said in a statement on Facebook.

Preventing the spread of the disease is the government’s top priority, Tsai said, adding that the inauguration — scheduled for May 20 — would only be held under certain conditions.

The government would temporarily halt preparations for the event, pending changes in the epidemic situation, she said.

Any event held would be smaller in scale than usual due to concerns over the spread of the disease, she added.

Tsai thanked the Buddhist Compassion Relief Tzu Chi Foundation, the Fo Guang Shan Monastery, Dharma Drum Mountain and other religious organizations for putting large-scale events on hold, or holding them online instead, to mitigate the risk of the disease spreading.

She also thanked members of the various religious groups for their understanding and cooperation at what she called a “crucial moment” in the fight against the spread of COVID-19.

The public’s cooperation has reduced the pressure on frontline disease-prevention officials, she added.

Responding to Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je’s (柯文哲) remark that Tsai was planning to hold her inauguration at the Taipei Music Center, which is administered by the Taipei City Government, one of Tsai’s aides said on condition of anonymity that the center, which is not scheduled to officially open until June, was among the options.

However, depending on the epidemic situation, the Presidential Office had informed the city government that it could cancel its reservation in favor of another venue, they said.

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Virus Outbreak: Over 300 Taiwanese tourists to return from S Korea after level 3 travel notice

More than 300 Taiwanese tourists are scheduled to return home after the Central Epidemic Command Center on Monday issued a level 3 “warning” travel notice for South Korea due to a rapid rise in the number of COVID-19 cases.

A level 3 travel notice cautions travelers against nonessential travel to a country.

As of 5pm on Tuesday, 304 Taiwanese were traveling in South Korea, the Tourism Bureau said.

More than a dozen local agencies are to return the Taiwanese from South Korea by midnight tomorrow, when they would be placed under a mandatory 14-day home quarantine, the bureau said.

Travel agencies must inform the travelers that they must comply with the disease-prevention measures after their return, the bureau said.

In the related news, the Ministry of Transportation and Communications is proposing a series of measures to bolster the airline and tourism industries, which have sustained huge financial losses as countries around the world have imposed travel restrictions to contain COVID-19.

Under the proposals, the government would provide Taiwanese airlines about NT$4.85 billion (US$159.63 million) in subsidies.

Estimates say airlines could see a 25 percent decline in passengers this year due to the virus.

Minister of Transportation and Communications Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) is negotiating with the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) to allow the public to use government-issued coupons to buy airline tickets and items in airports.

The Executive Yuan earlier this month said that the coupons would be redeemable at night markets and shopping districts.

The subsidy program for airlines, which would partially cover landing fees, maintenance and hangar usage fees, and other fees would be valid for one year, the ministry said.

Domestic operators of airplanes and helicopters can postpone payment of terminal usage charges, noise pollution compensation charges, land use fees and other fees for four months.

Airlines in need of emergency funding would be covered by the MOEA’s subsidy program, which would also subsidize interest on secured bank loans, the ministry said, adding that it has requested collateral of up to NT$20 billion.

Issues related to airlines’ freedom to fly during the virus crisis are to be handled with greater flexibility, the ministry added.

The Tourism Bureau has also proposed solutions to help the travel industry weather the virus crisis.

Travel agencies, hoteliers and tourism facility operators are allowed to seek assistance — from emergency relief funds to tax burden reductions — from the bureau.

An announcement about the regulations applying to the assistance would soon be made public, it said.

The bureau added that it would continue to providing travel subsidies to boost domestic tourism.

“Travel agencies and local government officials will be encouraged to work together and come up with innovative tours to attract international travelers, and we will offer incentives for them to do so,” the bureau said, adding that it would improve the facilities at travel destinations.

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content_text:
Council of Agriculture Minister Chen Chi-chung, front row left, attends the founding news conference of an alliance to promote animal welfare legislation in Taipei yesterday.Photo: CNA
A ban on euthanizing healthy stray animals, which has been in place for three years, needs to be re-evaluated to see whether it really improves animal welfare, Council of Agriculture Minister Chen Chi-chung (陳吉仲) said yesterday.

Chen made the remarks during a news conference in Taipei held by several animal rights groups, who have established an alliance to urge lawmakers to create more animal protection legislation.

The alliance called for enshrining animal protection in the Constitution and legalizing a compensation mechanism for people whose animals — not necessarily pets — are hurt by others.

It called for humanitarian rescue of animals, as well as the establishment of an animal protection police, zoological data-sharing and language promoting vegetarian diets.

The alliance also urged the government to create a system to foster veterinarians for laboratory animals, and devise animal-friendly methods to raise farm animals and aquaculture products.

As the new legislative session began last week, the groups hope that newly elected lawmakers would promote legislation covering the issues and boost communication with the public, Taiwan Animal Protection Monitor Network secretary-general Ho Tsung-hsun (何宗勳) said.

Animal protection should be addressed with regard to different categories of animals, such as pets, wild animals and economic animals, Chen said.

For example, the government in February 2017 implemented a ban on the mercy killing of healthy animals in public shelters, but whether the “advanced” policy has really improved animal welfare needs to be assessed, he said.

Animals in public shelters cannot be killed unless they are confirmed by veterinarians to have infectious or incurable diseases, seriously affect environmental hygiene or have other emergencies, the Animal Protection Act (動物保護法) states.

While the council has dedicated considerable funds to promote its “trap, neuter, vaccination and return” program for stray animals, the number of stray dogs has increased from 128,000 in 2017 to 147,000, while building new public animal shelters has proved difficult, he said.

Echoing Chen’s concern, Animal Protection Association chairman Lee Chao-chuan (李朝全) said that the ban was pushed by certain groups, despite a lack of complementary measures.

Lee, a former director of the Tainan Animal Health Inspection and Protection Office, said that more surveys on abandoned and stray animals are needed, while people in rural areas need to be educated about reducing canine breeding.

Protecting endangered wild animals, such as Formosan black bears, is a more pressing issue, Chen said.

The council would next month publish data about the numbers and habitat conditions of threatened species once a survey has been completed, he said.

The council is also promoting organic farming methods by offering farmers financial rewards in a bid to reduce insecticide poisoning in the food chain, he added.

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title: Euthanasia ban needs to be re-evaluated: minister


content_text:
Virus Outbreak: Countries scramble as coronavirus spreads from Italy

Governments worldwide yesterday were scrambling to prevent the spread of COVID-19 after fresh infections emerged linked to European hotspot Italy amid dire warnings that countries are not ready to contain the outbreak.

Giving most concern on that score in the Middle East, Iran has emerged as a major hotspot. Nineteen people have died and 44 further infections were reported across the country in the past 24 hours, including Iranian Deputy Minister of Health Iraj Harirchi.

In another crucial hotspot, South Korea, the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 284 new infections — its largest daily increase to date — taking the overall national tally to 1,261, with the death toll rising to 12.

The vast majority — 90 percent — of the new infections were in Daegu, the country’s fourth-largest city, and the neighboring province of North Gyeongsang.

The streets of Daegu — which has a population of 2.5 million — have been largely deserted for days.

Italy has become the latest major cause for concern after France, Austria, Croatia and Switzerland all reported infections in people who had recently been to its worst-hit Lombardy region.

France reported a second death — this time of one of its nationals after a Chinese tourist died earlier this month.

Greece reported its first case — a woman who had recently travelled to northern Italy — as did Algeria — an Italian national who had arrived in the country last week.

The first case in Latin America was also confirmed yesterday, after a Sao Paulo hospital had flagged the possible infection of a 61-year-old who had visited Italy.

Several governments are now advising people against travel to Italy, in particular to the regions worst affected in the north, as well as introducing checks for passengers arriving from the country.

The Italian outbreak has seen 12 deaths and 374 cases within the country.

Eleven towns have been put in isolation and tens of millions people have been affected by school closures, and the cancelation of cultural and sporting events.

At the WHO headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, WHO Assistant Director-General Bruce Aylward, who headed an international expert mission to China, hailed the drastic quarantine and containment measures taken by Beijing.

However, he told reporters on Tuesday that other nations were “simply not ready” to contain the outbreak.

“You have to be ready to manage this at a larger scale ... and it has to be done fast,” Aylward said.

The virus has killed 2,715 people and infected more than 78,000 in China.

There were 52 more deaths reported in China yesterday — the lowest in three weeks — with no fatalities outside the epicenter in Hubei Province.

The Chinese National Health Commission also reported a drop in new infections to 406, with only five outside Hubei — a figure that would boost confidence that the rest of the country is containing the epidemic.

Additional reporting by Reuters

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title: Apple, J&J partner for heart study

content_text:
Johnson & Johnson (J&J) on Tuesday said that it was partnering with Apple Inc to use an iPhone app and the Apple Watch to study how earlier detection of atrial fibrillation impacts stroke in people aged 65 or older.

Last year, Apple’s Heart Study — which analyzed the role of wearable devices in identifying potential heart problems — found that the watch could accurately detect atrial fibrillation, the most common type of irregular heartbeat.

Atrial fibrillation increases the risk of stroke more than fivefold, the American Heart Association said.

Apple chief operating officer Jeff Williams said that the initial study proved the Apple Watch could detect atrial fibrillation with a low rate of false alarms, which helped Apple gain clearance from the US Food and Drug Administration for a watch app that takes an electrocardiogram (EKG) measurement.

The study with J&J aims to show if early detection leads to better health outcomes.

“We want to follow the science all the way to the end, no matter what the outcomes are, and run this longitudinal study,” Williams said. “It’s not something that we have to do, but it’s the right thing to do.”

The joint effort, called “Heartline,” is significant because J&J is one of the world’s largest medical device makers and pharmaceutical companies.

“What we bring is clinical study capability on a very large scale,” J&J chief scientific officer Paul Stoffels said, adding that the study would track 150,000 participants with long-term follow-ups over two years.

The study could also reach a different population than Apple’s original heart study, which included 400,000 participants, but faced scrutiny from medical experts because more than half of the people who signed up were under 40, a group already at low risk for atrial fibrillation.

J&J said that it wants to target a population with a higher risk.

Paul Burton, vice president of medical affairs at the J&J subsidiary running the study, said that 70 percent of patients experiencing the condition are over 65.

“What we’re trying to do here is definitively answer that question: If you take wearable technology and couple it with an app, can you reduce the risk of a stroke or death?” Burton said.

The J&J study would be open to the more than 40 million people enrolled in traditional US Medicare plans, which cover people aged 65 and older, as well as the disabled. Study participants would be randomly assigned to either use only an iPhone app or use the app in conjunction with a watch capable of taking an EKG.

If patients who enroll are assigned to the arm of the study using the Apple Watch, they would be prompted to acquire one of the devices, which study officials said the participants could either purchase on their own for personal use for US$49 or borrow free of charge for the study.

The latest Apple Watch model starts at list price of US$399.

Burton said that J&J and Apple were sharing the cost of subsidizing the watches.

The study would pay participants, who must agree to share their Medicare claims data.

Apple and J&J officials said that was vital to proving whether the use of the app and watch lead to reduced stroke risk.

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title: Hsieh, Strycova reach Qatar quarters

content_text:
Hsieh, Strycova reach Qatar quarters

SLOW START:Taiwanese sisters Chan Hao-ching and Latisha Chan had to pull out of their second-round match, extending their run of poor results to start the season
Taiwanese-Czech duo Hsieh Su-wei and Barbora Strycova on Tuesday cruised into the quarter-finals of the doubles at the Qatar Open, while the Chan sisters’ bid to get their season up and running suffered another blow as they had to pull out of their second-round match.

Top seeds Hsieh and Strycova took just 59 minutes to see off unseeded Ukrainian twins Lyudmyla and Nadiia Kichenok 6-2, 6-2 at the Khalifa International Tennis and Squash Complex in Doha.

The victors in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, on Saturday saved the only break point they faced and converted four of nine, winning 81 percent of points on their first serve to advance to a quarter-final against Swiss-American pairing Belinda Bencic and Sofia Kenin, who defeated Chinese duo Han Xinyun and Peng Shuai 7-6 (7/3), 6-1 in 1 hour, 24 minutes.

The top seeds are eyeing their third title of the season after also winning in Brisbane, Australia, last month.

A disappointing start to the season for Taiwanese sisters Chan Hao-ching and Latisha Chan continued when the seventh seeds had to pull out of their second-round clash against Cagla Buyukakcay of Turkey and Laura Siegemund of Germany.

In the singles, Kenin suffered her third defeat since winning the Australian Open earlier this month, losing to Ukrainian youngster Dayana Yastremska in the second round, while world No. 1 Ashleigh Barty cruised to victory.

World No. 5 Kenin, who defeated Garbine Muguruza to claim her maiden Grand Slam singles title in Melbourne, went down 6-3, 7-6 (7/4) to Yastremska.

“It’s really frustrating,” the 21-year-old told the WTA Web site. “Obviously, coming off of Melbourne, where I felt I was playing the best tennis of my life, coming down to playing, not the worst tennis, but not playing the tennis I want to be playing.”

Yastremska was to face Muguruza in the third round after the Spaniard made short work of Australian Ajla Tomljanovic, winning 6-1, 6-2.

“Creds to her, she played well, came up with some good shots at those important moments,” Kenin said of Yastremska, who has already won three WTA Tour titles. “She just played better at important moments and I just made too many unforced errors, I just felt pretty flat-footed the whole match.”

Barty strolled past Siegemund in her first match since losing in the Australian Open semi-finals to Kenin.

The reigning French Open champion saw off the German 6-3, 6-2.

“Happy overall to be able to switch on when I really needed to,” Barty said. “Disappointing to have a few lapses in concentration, but also a credit to my opponent, she came up with some really good stuff in runs to be able to break me a few times.”

The Australian was due to face Elena Rybakina, who has already reached four WTA Tour finals this season and beat Alison van Uytvanck 5-7, 6-2, 7-6 (10/8).

The 20-year-old, who lost to Simona Halep in the Dubai singles final on Saturday last week, needed five match points to get past the Belgian, and also saved one herself in the marathon third-set tiebreak.

Two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova also booked a place in the round-of-16 with a 4-6, 6-3, 6-0 win over Spaniard Carla Suarez Navarro.

The Czech was to face former Roland Garros winner Jelena Ostapenko for a quarter-final spot after the Latvian’s 6-1, 6-2 thrashing of Strycova.

World No. 3 Karolina Pliskova also secured her berth with comfort, beating American Bernarda Pera 6-3, 6-0.

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content_text:
Peugeot maker PSA Group defied mounting pessimism in the auto industry by raising its dividend and offering assurances to investors that it could withstand a deepening slump.

While the French automaker that is working to combine with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV expects the European market to shrink this year, it published better-than-expected profit for last year and said that it has taken measures to protect the company from a decline.

PSA reported record net income of 3.2 billion euros (US$3.48 billion) compared with 2.83 billion euros a year earlier. The group’s adjusted operating income of 6.32 billion euros beat an average forecast of 6.14 billion euros of analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.

PSA earnings contrast with a general souring of the global auto industry in recent weeks, with China grappling to contain a COVID-19 outbreak that has shuttered factories and hobbled supply chains across continents.

The company depends heavily on Europe for its sales, which fell 10 percent overall to 3.5 million vehicles last year.

Despite the drop, PSA’s profit margin widened to 8.5 percent amid chief executive officer Carlos Tavares’ relentless lowering of costs and focus on selling expensive models.

Adjusted operating income last year rose a better-than-expected 11 percent to 6.32 billion euros.

The company kept a target for the 2019-2021 average automotive adjusted operating margin of more than 4.5 percent, a level chief financial officer Philippe de Rovira called a “floor” and very conservative.

“Our internal target is always to improve performance, so let’s not be misled by this indicator,” he said on a call with reporters.

In the past, the margin has been boosted by excluding restructuring charges from operating profit, Bloomberg Intelligence analysts have said.

The company has reported charges for cost cutting at Opel and Vauxhall, but also Peugeot, Citroen and DS. Last month it unveiled job reductions at Opel.

The French manufacturer sees the European market shrinking 3 percent this year and Russia declining 2 percent.

That is more than the 2 percent decline in Europe expected by the main lobby group, a forecast published before the extent of the virus outbreak became known.

Other European automakers have so far signaled a mixed year at best.

While Daimler AG has forecast an earnings rebound following several profit warnings and a dividend cut, it has also warned of more possible regulatory costs in coming months and “significant adverse effects” from the virus outbreak in China.

German luxury-vehicle rival BMW AG is sticking to its sales growth target for China, even as it acknowledged uncertainty about when the situation would return to normal.

PSA’s French rival, Renault SA, earlier this month posted its first annual loss in a decade and indicated that operating margins are set to shrink.

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title: Peugeot parent says it can weather market downturn


title: Virus Outbreak: Hong Kong banks face outbreak toll

content_text:
Hong Kong’s banks face at least two quarters of worsening asset quality and slowing loan growth as the coronavirus outbreak hits trade and consumer banking, analysts and bankers said.

Lenders in the Asian financial hub, including HSBC Holdings PLC and Standard Chartered PLC, are seeing a drop in demand for mortgages, credit card usage and corporate loans, bankers with knowledge of the matter said.

Hong Kong banks have Asia’s largest exposure to China, which accounted for 29.4 percent of banking system assets in the first half of last year, credit ratings agency Fitch says.

Some of the banks have already started stress testing select parts of their China and Hong Kong businesses as fears grow of a pandemic of COVID-19 that originated in China late last year.

“Some of the companies in Hong Kong were already hanging from a thread after months of civil unrest and now the virus has come on top of that,” Moody’s Investors Service financial institutions group senior credit officer Sonny Hsu (徐嵩宜) said.

“The combined effect will be much more. This time, it will be more of a problem loan and credit cost issue,” Hsu said.

An extended disruption to economic activities would weaken the banks’ asset quality and profitability, and would be a credit negative, the rating agency said.

“[The] first quarter is usually a busy month for us as clients work on their plans for the year ahead. This year, the trade finance volume is down 15 percent to 30 percent in China and Hong Kong,” a senior banker at a large global bank in Hong Kong said.

The biggest impact on asset quality in Hong Kong would come from retail, hotels and property as the territory’s economy, already in recession after months of pro-democracy protests, faces increased headwinds from the virus outbreak, the banker added.

Some banks are also concerned about the likely push from Chinese authorities to extend loan repayment periods as well as make cheaper credit available, the bankers said.

“We are not thinking about origination of new business much — [the] bulk of work is focused on minimizing the hit to asset quality. It won’t be business as usual for the next two quarters at least,” a retail banker with a global bank said.

Unemployment in Hong Kong reached its highest in three years last month at 3.4 percent, while bankruptcy petitions submitted rose to 703 last month up from 665 a year ago, data showed.

HSBC, which made 40 percent of its revenue from China and Hong Kong last year, said last week it could take up to US$600 million in additional provisions against loan losses if the outbreak persists into the second half.

Bank of East Asia (BEA, 東亞銀行) on Wednesday last week said that it expected a deterioration of 10-20 basis points in credit cost, the percentage of provisioning for bad loans out of total lending, for its local business this year due to the economic downturn.

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content_text:
Virus Outbreak: College exams turning to online interviews, Pan says

Minister of Education Pan Wen-chung tells reporters outside the ministry in Taipei yesterday about the provision of disease-prevention supplies to elementary and high schools, where classes have resumed this week.Photo: Rachel Lin, Taipei Times
Minister of Education Pan Wen-chung (潘文忠) yesterday said that universities are adopting different measures for students seeking college admissions, such as conducting interviews via video conferences, amid concern over the spread of COVID-19.

More than 130,000 students are expected to take part in interviews — the second segment of the college entrance exam, Pan said.

The ministry is also working to ensure that proper disease-

prevention measures are taken for the Comprehensive Assessment Program for Junior High School Students, scheduled to be held on May 16 and 17, with about 215,000 students participating; followed by the joint entrance exam for vocational colleges, with about 95,000 students participating; and the Advanced Subjects Test in July, he said.

The ministry has shared with other schools the detailed and comprehensive plans adopted by National Cheng Kung University, China Medical University, Asia University and Chang Gung University to safeguard against the spread of COVID-19, he said.

As university students return to school, the ministry would visit schools that have not yet made adequate preparations, he added.

Starting next month, the Ministry of Education is to deliver 94,000 liters of alcohol disinfectants to schools on a monthly basis as part of its preventive measures, Pan said.

The ministry is also expected to deliver a first batch of 84,000 liters of alcohol disinfectants to schools, cram schools, after-school programs and other facilities by Thursday next week.

A supply of 12,500 forehead thermometers has already been delivered to schools, Pan told reporters before attending a meeting in Taipei, adding that another 12,500 is expected to be sent on Monday.

About 4,100 elementary to senior-high schools had been disinfected before classes resumed on Tuesday after the extended Lunar New Year break, he said.

Students’ temperatures were taken on Tuesday before classes and 578 were found to have a fever, he said, adding that they were housed in a separate area before being picked up by their parents, Pan said.

The Department of Information and Technology Education and local-level education agencies are prepared for remote teaching should classes be suspended, he added.

Asked whether there was a shortage of thermometers at Chung Shan Industrial and Commercial School in Kaohsiung, Pan said that according to K-12 Education Administration Deputy Director-General Tai Shu-fen (戴淑芬), who visited the school on Tuesday, temperature checks at the school ran smoothly.

In response to New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi’s (侯友宜) announcement that schools in the city would not be hosting graduation trips or field trips in the meantime, Pan said the ministry respects the local government’s decision.

“Student health is the top priority,” he said.

The ministry had earlier released a list of items to watch out for when hosting field trips, but the situation is always changing, he said.

Schools should assess the situation carefully when hosting trips, he said.

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content_text:
A moving requiem and jazzy Shakespeare at Weiwuying

A British-Taiwanese coproduction of Benjamin Britten’s masterful ‘War Requim’ will have its Kaohsiung premiere tomorrow night, while the Tainaner Ensemble gives two performances of its musical version of ‘Twelfth Night’
The English National Opera’s production of Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem will be performed at the National Kaohsiung Center for the Arts tomorrow and Sunday, featuring the National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra, Taipei Philharmonic Chorus and Century Voice Choir and guest soloists.Photo courtesy of National Kaohsiung Center for the Arts

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The musical and emotional contrasts of the two productions at the National Kaohsiung Center for the Arts — Weiwuying this weekend could not be more dramatic: A powerful passifistic choral elegy for the dead of two world wars and jazzy riff on one of William Shakespeare’s romantic comedies.

One is a Taiwan debut, the other is a touring revival of a popular 2018 production.

Tickets for either show would normally be hot sellers, but these are not normal times, given the concern about the potential spread of COVID-19 in Taiwan and the reluctance of many people to enter public venues, so there are still plenty of tickets at all price levels.

That means if you are worried about sitting too close to other people, there will be room to spread out.

In addition, the National Performing Arts Center, the umbrella organization for the National Theater Concert Hall in Taipei, Weiwuying and the National Taichung Theater, earlier this month imposed disease-prevention protocols at all of its venues.

Disinfection measures have been increased, employees are required to have their temperatures taken daily and frontline staff must wear masks while on duty, while audience members must have their temperatures checked before entering a venue, and while they are not required to wear masks, it is encouraged.

A Weiwuying-English National Opera (ENO) coproduction of Benjamin Britten’s famed War Requiem, which premiered in London in November 2018, will have its Taiwan premier tomorrow night, an apt choice to honor 228 and the 228 Peace Memorial Day.

Weiwuying artistic director Chien Wen-pin (簡文彬), who will conduct National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra (國立臺灣交響樂團) for the two performances, on Tuesday told a news conference that staging the show on 228 and on the site of a former military encampment, gives the production an added layer of meaning.

War Requiem gives voice to the sense of helplessness and confusion people feel in times of war, he said.

War Requiem premiered on May 30, 1962, to mark the consecration of the rebuilt 14th-century St Michael’s Cathedral in Coventy, England, which had been almost completely destroyed by German bombing on Nov. 14, 1940.

Britten, a noted pacifist and conscientious objector, used the traditional Latin text for a Catholic requiem and battlefield poems by English poet Wilfred Owen, who was killed in France during World War I.

Taiwanese soprano Chen Mei-lin (陳美玲), Welsh tenor Joshua Owen Mills and Singaporean baritone Martin Ng (吳翰衛) are the featured soloists who will perform alongside the Taipei Philharmonic Chorus (台北愛樂合唱團) and the Century Voice Choir (世紀合唱團), a children’s group.

Former ENO artistic director Daniel Kramer has been in Kaohsiung to direct the production, which he created along with Turner Prize-winning photographer Wolfgang Tillmans, who did the stage design.

The production has a running time of 90 minutes and will be performed in Latin and English, with Mandarin and English subtitles.

Next door in the Playhouse, the Tainaner Ensemble’s (台南人劇團) revival of its 2018 jazz musical version of William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night (第十二夜) opens tomorrow night as well, for the first of two shows.

Directed by Lu Po-Shen (呂柏伸), with music by Blaire Ko (柯智豪) and lyrics by Chao Chi-Yun (趙啟運), this all-singing, all-dancing take on Shakespeare’s comedy about gender and identity, deception and romance, premiered in the fall of 2018 at the Cloud Gate Theater.


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Spanish opera singer Placido Domingo speaks during a news conference in Moscow on Oct. 15 last year.Photo: EPA-EFE
Facing multiple allegations of sexual harassment, international opera star Placido Domingo on Tuesday apologized for “the hurt” caused to his accusers, as a union probe found he engaged in a pattern of “inappropriate activity.”

The 79-year-old — a mainstay of some of the world’s most prestigious opera houses — delivered the apology as the American Guild of Musical Artists (AGMA) wrapped up an independent investigation into the storied tenor-turned-baritone, which was launched in September last year over members’ allegations of sexual harassment and discrimination.

At least 20 women have accused Domingo of forcibly kissing, grabbing or fondling them in incidents dating back to at least the 1980s.

He has maintained that his relationships were consensual, and in the apology did not specifically confirm any allegations.

“I respect that these women finally felt comfortable enough to speak out, and I want them to know that I am truly sorry for the hurt that I caused them. I accept full responsibility for my actions,” he said in a statement.

AGMA published a statement saying its internal probe “concluded that Mr Domingo had, in fact, engaged in inappropriate activity, ranging from flirtation to sexual advances, in and outside of the workplace.”

“Many of the witnesses expressed fear of retaliation in the industry as their reason for not coming forward sooner,” the opera, choral and dance union said, adding that its board had “accepted the findings of the report and will take appropriate action.”

It said the full probe would remain internal — hours before the New York Times reported inquiry finding leaks had spoiled a deal between AGMA and Domingo, which would have seen the union limit public statements regarding its findings.

The Times said a plan had been in the works for Domingo to pay the union US$500,000 in exchange for privacy concerning the inquiry.

However, a “flagrant breach of confidentiality” caused Domingo’s legal team to drop the agreement, the paper said, citing an e-mail from union leaders to its board.

The performer’s spokeswoman, Nancy Seltzer, said that “what is truthful is we are in ongoing discussions with the union on how to move forward.”

Asked about the Times report, AGMA representatives did not immediately respond.

Harassment allegations against Domingo first began surfacing in August last year. Two months later, he stepped down from the Los Angeles Opera and withdrew from further performances at New York’s Metropolitan Opera, effectively ending his US career.

Many fans and fellow performers leapt to Domingo’s defense, describing him as an innocent “ladies’ man.”

However, reports drew a picture of a man who acted with impunity, shielded by his power as one of opera’s foremost stars, as a whisper network evolved warning women about his alleged reputation.

Several women said Domingo tried pressuring them into sexual relationships by dangling jobs, and then sometimes punished them professionally when they refused his advances.

Domingo on Tuesday said that had “never” been his intention.

“I understand now that some women may have feared expressing themselves honestly because of a concern that their careers would be adversely affected if they did so,” he said.

“While that was never my intention, no one should ever be made to feel that way,” he added.

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title: Domingo apologizes for ‘inappropriate’ behavior


content_text:
HK signals record budget deficit, planning handouts

STIMULUS MEASURES:The budget proposal includes cash handouts to residents aged over 18, lower taxes and subsidies, and funds ‘to promote the rule of law’
Members of the League of Social Democrats protest outside the Legislative Council building before Hong Kong Financial Secretary Paul Chan delivered the territory’s annual budget speech yesterday.Photo: AFP
Hong Kong yesterday unveiled a record budget deficit, pledging cash handouts to residents and business tax breaks to soften the blow to the recession-hit economy from often-violent protests and the COVID-19 outbreak.

While the measures are not expected to arrest the downturn in the territory, they would provide households and companies hit hard with some financial relief, analysts said.

However, longer-term questions remain over whether the stimulus can restore public trust in the most unpopular administration since the former British colony returned to Chinese rule in 1997, according to opinion polls.

“Hong Kong has been saving for a rainy day. This is it, this is the rainy day,” Union Bancaire Privee chief Asia investment strategist Anthony Chan said. “There is also political reasoning behind the relief and emergency measures.”

The territory recorded its first budget deficit in 15 years in this fiscal year, at HK$37.8 billion (US$4.85 billion), or about 1.3 percent of GDP.

In his budget speech, Hong Kong Financial Secretary Paul Chan (陳茂波) flagged deficits for the next five years.

The 2019-2020 budget included more than HK$30 billion to cushion the hit from the protests, which saw activists and police clashing in shopping malls and in the financial district. It also included HK$30 billion in handouts for health authorities, small and medium-sized enterprises, and low-income residents.

“No one could have predicted that social incidents would break out in the middle of the year, which not only hit our economy, but also broke our hearts,” Paul Chan told legislators. “Before we could sort things out, there was an unexpected outbreak of the novel coronavirus disease. Preventing and fighting against the epidemic ... are our top priority.”

For the 2020-2021 fiscal year, he said he expected a budget deficit of 4.8 percent of GDP, or HK$139.1 billion, a record in nominal terms.

In 2003-2004, when Hong Kong faced a recession caused by the SARS outbreak, the deficit reached 5.3 percent of GDP, ANZ analysts said.

The projected shortfall, which was larger than most analysts expected, accounts for lower revenues, as well as another HK$120 billion in mostly one-off relief measures, including handouts of HK$10,000 to Hong Kong residents aged over 18, tax breaks for companies and other subsidies.

Paul Chan said that while public spending was large, current circumstances were unique and the payouts would not impose a long-term fiscal burden.

Fiscal reserves are estimated at HK$937.1 billion by the end of March 2025, down from a forecast of HK$1.1 trillion for next month, a drop that leaves economists relaxed about the currency peg to the US dollar.

Also included in the budget are funds for the Hong Kong Department of Justice to launch a HK$450 million campaign to promote the rule of law, entitled “Vision 2030 for Rule of Law.”

The goal is to “strengthen our community’s understanding of the concept of the rule of law and its implementation,” Paul Chan said. “Respect for the rule of law and independence of the judiciary are among the cornerstones underpinning Hong Kong’s success.”

Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam (林鄭月娥) praised the budget plans.

“In these unprecedented times, I am confident that the 2020-21 budget proposals will provide effective and targeted support to help the Hong Kong community withstand the current difficulties and gear up for a brighter tomorrow,” Lam said in a statement.

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content_text:
B: Do they make it in time?

A: Are you sure you want to hear a spoiler? I thought you were planning to watch the movie.

B: Oh yeah, silly me. I was getting caught up in the gripping storyline.

A: I remember you really enjoyed 2017’s Dunkirk, so I think 1917 will be right up your street. Hurry up and watch it, and then we can swap notes.

B : 他們後來有及時完成任務嗎？

A : 你確定你要聽電影劇透嗎？我以為你打算要去看這部電影耶。

B : 對哦，我真笨。我完全被這個扣人心弦的故事情節迷住了。

A : 我記得你很喜歡二○一七年上映的《敦克爾克大行動》，所以我想《一九一七》應該也是你的菜。趕快去看吧，這樣我們可以交換心得。

English 英文:

Chinese 中文:

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title: EVERYDAY ENGLISH


content_text:
Togo hedges its bets on solar energy for its rural poor

IN THE DARK:Until 2017, only 30 percent of Togolese had power, but now nearly 50 percent do, although the nation relies heavily on Ghana and Nigeria for supplies
Site engineer Alassani Damoni speaks about the solar panels installed at Takpapieni village in northern Togo on Feb. 14.Photo: AFP
Not so long ago, whenever he wanted to watch a soccer match or recharge his mobile phone, Ousmane Kantcho had to go “into town” — a 15km ride by bicycle on bad roads in the savannah.

His village, Tababou, lies more than 600km from the Togolese capital, Lome.

There, in one of Africa’s most energy-starved places, homes would plunge into darkness at nightfall, for the village was not connected to the national electricity grid. Torches provided the only light.

“After 6pm prayers, everyone stayed at home — there was nothing to do,” said Kantcho, a 35-year-old farmer.

“Everything’s different now,” he said, turning on his TV set.

Tababou has gone solar.

“Everyone gets together to watch the match at home and the children can do their homework late in the evening,” Kantcho said.

The creature comforts that are standard around the world — lights, TV and electrical sockets — have become available thanks to a 50-watt solar panel, installed on the roof of Kantcho’s mud-walled hut.

Kantcho and thousands of others are the beneficiaries of a public-private initiative launched in 2018 that aims to provide electricity across the West African country by 2030.

That objective, budgeted at 952 billion CFA francs (US$1.58 billion), would be met in great part by bringing in clean, renewable energy in rural areas, where most of Togo’s 8 million people live.

Locally generated power is far cheaper than connecting remote villages to a central grid — and helps to wean Togo off energy imported from Ghana and Nigeria, which provide half of its electricity needs.

“Not so long ago, we were really far behind other countries in the region, but we’ve gone full-bore over the last two years,” Abbas Abdoulaye, head of Togo’s agency for rural electrification and renewable energy, AT2ER, told reporters.

Only 30 percent of all Togolese had access to electricity in 2016 and 2017, a figure that has risen to nearly 50 percent today, he said.

Half of Togo’s population lives on less than US$1.90 per day, the threshold of extreme poverty, the World Bank has said.

People in more than 2,200 villages so far have taken the plunge by buying a solar home system, a kit comprising a solar panel, a charge controller to regulate power and a battery to store the energy for when the sun is not shining.

The kit is enough to power lights, a radio and a small TV for several hours a day.

The systems are being sold and installed by private companies, such as Britain’s Bboxx, which said it has sold more than 150,000 systems in more than 35 countries.

Customers pay an installation charge of about 10,000 CFA francs and then pay off the cost of the gadget in monthly installments of 4,800 CFA francs over the next three years. Half of the cost is subsidized by the state.

“It operates a bit like microcredit,” Bboxx marketing director for Togo Alexandre Kouigan said.

More than 500,000 households would get individual kits over the next decade, the government hopes.

According to a report by the UN Environment Programme and the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management, Africa offers one of the world’s most promising markets for solar — investment rose 19 percent in 2018 from 2017, to US$10.1 billion.

Some villages in Togo are opting for a more sophisticated system — so-called solar mini-grids, comprising a centralized group of panels to harvest the sunlight, and whose power is shared among households and shops and nearby cellphone towers.

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title: Weinstein energized about appeal: lawyer

content_text:
The Silence Breakers, a group of women who spoke out about film producer Harvey Weinstein’s sexual misconduct, hug after a news conference outside Los Angeles City Hall on Tuesday, a day after the Weinstein verdict.Photo: Reuters
A hospitalized Harvey Weinstein was “upbeat” and “energized” about appealing his sexual assault and rape conviction, one of his lawyers said on Tuesday, as one of Weinstein’s accusers said the verdict made her feel grateful to be “heard and believed.”

Weinstein remained in a jail unit at Bellevue Hospital in New York City, where he was taken after the verdict on Monday to be checked out for heart palpitations and high blood pressure.

Attorney Arthur Aidala called the hospitalization “a precautionary measure to take him here and make sure his vitals and everything were OK,” adding that it was not clear how long Weinstein would be at Bellevue.

After Monday’s verdict, he had been destined for jail to await sentencing, set for March 11.

In the meantime, Weinstein greeted his lawyer, unhandcuffed, in a large hospital room with jail officers outside and was looking forward to visitors, Aidala said.

“He’s in pretty good spirits. He’s energized,” the attorney told reporters.

He said the 67-year-old former film producer was insisting on his innocence and “somewhat flabbergasted by the verdict,” but determined to fight on.

“There is a portion of him where he’s just scratching his head and he doesn’t know how this happened, but he’s cautiously optimistic” about prevailing on appeal, Aidala said.

His remarks came after Mimi Haleyi, a former production assistant who accused Weinstein of forcing oral sex on her in 2006, called the verdict “a huge relief.”

“I just think that we’re being educated about the reality of sexual assault and sexual assault victims,” Haleyi said on CBS This Morning.

“It’s not always just a stranger. It’s very often somebody that the person knows, and with that comes an entire other layer of processing,” she said.

“Whatever the verdict had been, it wouldn’t have changed what happened to me, but obviously it was terrifying to think that I wouldn’t be believed,” she added later on MSNBC.

Weinstein faces a possible sentence of five to 29 years after a Manhattan jury convicted him of sexually assaulting Haleyi and raping an aspiring actress in 2013.

He was acquitted of first-degree rape and two counts of predatory sexual assault.

Weinstein has maintained that any sex between him and his accusers was consensual.

Asked about Weinstein on Tuesday, US President Donald Trump called the disgraced producer’s conviction a “great victory” for women that “sends a very strong message.”

“He was a person I didn’t like,” Trump told reporters during a news conference in India. “The people that liked him were the Democrats. [Former US first lady] Michelle Obama loved him. Loved him. [Former US secretary of state] Hillary [Rodham] Clinton loved him.”

Trump himself stands accused of sexual misconduct, including a rape allegation, by more than a dozen women when he was a private citizen.

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title: New school semester comes with virus issues

content_text:
Elementary schools, high schools and certain universities on Tuesday reopened after the extended winter vacation, presenting new challenges in the fight against the spread of COVID-19.

Schools plan to take the temperature of anyone entering their campuses, which is certain to slow the flow of people, and is sure to be exacerbated by the sheer volume of parents dropping off children.

The vehicles and the staff measuring students’ temperatures all crammed outside the main gates is a recipe for traffic chaos, requiring judicious traffic measures.

Many people are familiar with the story of British Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson who, as a child, was riding a pony to school with his elder brother when they encountered a large snow drift. His brother wanted to turn back, but Nelson, undeterred, insisted that they push on.

With the coronavirus threatening to spread in the nation, students and parents would do well to forget this story. If they have a fever, they should stay at home.

The government has instructed schools to keep windows open during class, even when air conditioning is on.

Unfortunately, a warm spell has just started, and many classrooms are near main roads, where noise from outdoors makes it impossible to hear the teacher. Some classrooms do not have windows. Therefore, some degree of flexibility is needed.

Good hand hygiene is effective in preventing the spread of the virus, but whether schools have sufficient sinks or wash basins, and whether soap is provided, is an issue, as is whether teachers remind students to wash their hands.

Many schools allocate cleaning tasks to students, such as maintaining public spaces. For the time being, schools should consider whether these cleaning duties are appropriate.

Toilets are areas where students could easily pick up the virus, so if schools continue to have students clean there, they should ensure that proper protective measures are in place, that the students are aware of the importance of protecting themselves and that they have the training to do so.

The regulations for canceling classes in the unfortunate event that there is a confirmed case among teachers, staff or students have been announced.

However, while the regulations governing whether a whole class needs to be canceled are quite clear, the same cannot be said for universities.

Given the nature of the elective course system, if a student is confirmed to have the virus, it poses all kinds of problems.

Students might be enrolled in five classes, all with different teachers and students, and all of those teachers would be teaching other classes, which would all have additional groups of students. Are all of them to be quarantined at home for 14 days?

There is also a shortage of the equipment that schools and universities need to carry out disease-prevention measures: Devices such as infrared, forehead and ear thermometers, as well as masks, are all necessary.

Instead of leaving individual schools to scramble to acquire equipment and personnel that they need to implement the required disease-prevention measures, it would make more sense for the central and local governments to coordinate the distribution of these resources, making sure that they are sent where they are needed.

Everyone should approach the disease-prevention effort as they would a military campaign. Everyone must be vigilant.

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title: Movie Review: Someone Who Was Lost

content_text:
Ng Chi Wai, left, Shih Tian-chih, center and Kwok Yi-kuan star in Someone Who Was Lost.Photo courtesy of atmovies.com
It’s hard to tell whether Someone Who Was Lost (失路人) is telling an absurdist tale of reckless, disenchanted youth or genuinely trying to make them seem like cool kids living on the edge like there’s no tomorrow.

Set in modern-day, post-protest Hong Kong, the film features a local brother and sister Tsung (Ng Chi Wai, 吳志維) and Panda (Kwok Yi Kwan, 郭爾君) scraping by on their own and their stoic Taiwanese college student buddy Taizai (Shih Tian-chih, 石田知), who have fled to Taiwan after inadvertently killing someone in a dispute. The film seems to aim for that kind of end-of-times, hardscrabble mood reminiscent of Made In Hong Kong (香港製造), Fruit Chan’s (陳果) iconic debut feature released right after the handover of Hong Kong to China in 1997.

Featuring Sam Lee (李璨琛), Made in Hong Kong also featured youth from rough backgrounds who have little to live for in times of uncertainty. There are significant parallel features in the films, both highlighting the tender side of the characters (at times in strikingly similar ways) while relying on the absurd to make the bleakness palatable.

But compared to Chan’s masterpiece, Someone Who Was Lost is too glossy and sappy, lacking the rawness and grit that made wasted youth films such as Trainspotting so powerful. It’s as if the filmmakers are trying to make the bleakness look warm and cute, to the point where they’re being overly sympathetic to the characters who never seem to show much remorse, self reflection or even grasp the graveness of their situation. The victim was a bad person who was oppressing the trio, but it was still a crime.

Nonetheless, Cheong makes a solid statement on the current atmosphere of doom and gloom in Hong Kong, especially with many disgruntled residents seeing Taiwan as a refuge from their problems. But can running away really solve everything?

Someone Who Was Lost 失路人

DIRECTED BY: Cheong Chi-wai (張志威)

STARRING: Shih Tian-chih (石田知) as Taizai, Ng Chi Wai (吳志維) as Tsung, Kwok Yi Kwan (郭爾君) as Panda and Chen Yi-wen (陳以文) as Taizai’s father

LANGUAGES: Mandarin, Cantonese and Taiwanese with English and Chinese subtitles

RUNNING TIME:87 MINUTES

TAIWAN RELEASE:In theaters

The film is the first collaboration between the Central Motion Pictures Corporation and film students at Taipei National University of the Arts (TNUA), which is definitely a positive development for Taiwan’s film industry. Wang Toon (王童), who received the lifetime achievement award at the Golden Horse last November and teaches at TNUA, serves as executive producer while Macau directing student Cheong Chi-wai (張志威) helms the piece.

The story is inspired by the 2016 body-in-cement murder case in Hong Kong where the suspects fled to Taiwan. Due to the lack of law enforcement cooperation measures, all Taiwanese authorities could do was deport the suspects back to Hong kong after cancelling their visa. This case is an important factor in the story, as Taizai becomes the only person the police can actually arrest.

Chen Yi-wen (陳以文) reprises a similar role from Golden Horse darling A Sun (陽光普照) as the stern police father of Taizai, and he delivers with conviction in the little we see of him in the film. Veteran actress Huang Rou-ming (黃柔閩) also shines in her big screen debut as the seemingly frail mother who is determined to protect her son at all costs.

Ng, who is also a TNUA student, does his best to play the devil-may-care Tsung with swagger (we won’t compare him to Sam Lee) who has a tender heart, though Shih’s delivery is rather awkward and stunted.

Overall, the film is a good attempt, beautifully shot and consistent throughout in tone; it starts slow but does pick up the tension as the story moves on. It is invaluable to have film students participate in such a professional project, and despite its flaws, it is a step in the right direction for Taiwan’s cinema.


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Virus Outbreak: Japanese leader urges reduction of sports events

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe yesterday called for sports and cultural events to be scrapped or curtailed for two weeks as Japan battles to stem a COVID-19 contagion amid mounting concerns that the Tokyo Olympics could be canceled.

Abe’s call came after a Tokyo baseball team said that it would play games in an empty stadium this weekend, while two businesses in central Tokyo reported confirmed cases of infection one day after the government had urged companies to encourage staff to work from home or stagger commutes.

“Taking into account that the next one to two weeks are extremely important in stopping the spread of infection, the government considers there to be a large risk of transmission at sports, cultural events and large gatherings of people,” Abe said.

The Yomiuri Giants said that they would stage pre-season baseball games versus cross-town rivals the Yakult Swallows at the Tokyo Dome, but with no fans in the building.

Located in the central Bunkyo ward, the stadium can seat more than 40,000 spectators.

The growing shadow over the Olympics came as Dentsu Group, an advertising giant deeply involved in the Games, told employees to work from home after a confirmed coronavirus case at its central Tokyo headquarters.

In another confirmed case, property developer Mitsubishi Estate said that one of its skyscrapers in the Marunouchi business district had been visited by a person with the virus.

Japan’s government has shifted strategy in fighting the contagion, seeking to slow its expansion and minimize the number of deaths rather than stopping it completely, now seen as impossible.

Earlier yesterday, Japanese Minister for the Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games Seiko Hashimoto sought to quell fears that the Tokyo Games could be canceled.

International Olympic Committee (IOC) member Dick Pound on Tuesday said that the Games would more likely be canceled than postponed or moved should the virus threat enforce any change in schedule, the Associated Press reported, with a decision necessary by May.

“The IOC is preparing for the Tokyo Games as scheduled,” Hashimoto told the Diet when asked about Pound’s comment. “We will continue our preparations so that the IOC can make sound decisions.”

In a briefing with reporters, Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said that he had been told by the IOC that Pound’s comment that any cancelation decision would be made in May was not the committee’s official stance.

Officials have consistently denied that the Olympics would be postponed or canceled, but Tokyo has been forced to postpone training for volunteers, with large-scale gatherings like next month’s Tokyo Marathon already voluntarily curtailed or halted altogether.

The IOC does have something that could cushion the blow in case of cancelation: a US$897 million reserve fund to help finance global sports.

The fund was established as a backstop for international sports federations that rely on the committee to balance their budgets, said Pound, the IOC’s longest-serving member.

That is not soccer or basketball, but smaller sports like judo, volleyball and water polo.

Part of the IOC’s broader risk management strategy, the fund was established in 2001 with US$105 million. It had grown to US$422 million by 2008.

“It’s a significant number, and would keep all the balls in the air if we actually missed a Games,” Pound said in an interview.

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Antoine Griezmann on Tuesday rescued a 1-1 draw for Barcelona at SSC Napoli in their UEFA Champions League last-16 first leg.

Frenchman Griezmann struck just before the hour mark in Naples after Dries Mertens had put the hosts ahead in the 30th minute with his 121st Napoli goal, drawing level with Marek Hamsik as the club’s all-time top scorer.

Barcelona ended the game with 10 men after Arturo Vidal was sent off with two minutes to go after picking up two yellow cards, following an angry clash with Napoli defender Mario Rui.

“In the end it’s a draw that is a good result, considering that we have another home game,” Barcelona coach Quique Setien said, as his side are in a strong position ahead of the second leg at the Camp Nou on March 18.

The clash was the first between the two teams and also a Champions League debut for Setien and Napoli counterpart Gennaro Gattuso, who took over after the group stage.

“They didn’t hurt us, they tickled us,” Gattuso said, but added that “it went wrong in one moment and they punished us.”

Napoli captain Lorenzo Insigne added: “We could have won, so we’re a bit disappointed. It was emotional to face players like [Lionel] Messi.”

Messi failed to score on his first appearance at the Stadio San Paolo, where Napoli legend Diego Maradona reigned supreme three decades ago.

Messi, 32, scored four goals over the weekend in Barcelona’s 5-0 win against Sociedad Deportiva Eibar that put them back top of La Liga, but could not add to his 114 Champions League goals.

“If Barca didn’t do today what they did three days ago [against Eibar] it’s to Napoli’s credit,” Gattuso said. “I hope that no one thinks it’s over. We know it will be very hard, but nothing is finished yet.”

“But when on your back you have Messi or Griezmann, you want to play with a little security. This is where we can try to do better on the way back,” he added.

Messi fired over on nine minutes after combining well with Frenkie de Jong, but Gattuso’s side piled the pressure on the Catalans.

Their pressing paid off on the half-hour mark, with Piotr Zielinski breaking free down the right before finding Mertens, who curled a magnificent finish past Marc-Andre ter Stegen.

He equaled Hamsik’s record and is now six goals clear of Maradona, but was forced off early in the second half after a Sergio Busquets tackle, for which the Spaniard is to be suspended for the second leg.

Barcelona did not waste much time in getting on level terms, as Messi and Busquets combined to send Semedo into the box in the 57th minute.

The Portuguese fullback crossed low for Griezmann to power home right-footed.

Ter Stegen denied Insigne, with Jose Callejon also missing a chance for a second, as did Messi with eight minutes to go.

Vidal was sent off after a sliding tackle on Rui before appearing to headbutt the Napoli defender.

The Chilean would also miss the return leg in Spain, with defender Gerard Pique a doubt after going off late on with an ankle injury.

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title: Griezmann saves Barca against Napoli


title: Duffy says she was raped, drugged and held captive

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Welsh singer Duffy performs on stage at the Caprices Festival in Crans Montana, Switzerland, on April 15, 2009.Photo: EPA-EFE
The Welsh singer Duffy on Tuesday attributed her long musical hiatus to a violent assault that saw her “raped and drugged and held captive over some days.”

The Grammy winner, who in 2011 said she was “taking a break” from the public spotlight, said in an emotional Instagram post that “I am ok and safe now,” but that recovery “took time.”

“There’s no light way to say it. But I can tell you in the last decade, the thousands and thousands of days I committed to wanting to feel the sunshine in my heart again, the sun does now shine,” the 35-year-old posted. “You wonder why I did not choose to use my voice to express my pain? I did not want to show the world the sadness in my eyes. I asked myself, how can I sing from the heart if it is broken? And slowly it unbroke.”

The singer-songwriter found global fame after releasing her debut album Rockferry in 2008, which won a Grammy for Best Pop Vocal Album.

In 2009, the artist born Aimee Anne Duffy also won three Brit awards.

She said in Tuesday’s social media post that she had decided to break her silence over her trauma after giving an interview to an unnamed journalist last summer, and would begin “posting a spoken interview” in the weeks to come.

“If you have any questions I would like to answer them, in the spoken interview, if I can,” she said. “I have a sacred love and sincere appreciation for your kindness over the years. You have been friends.”

In 2013, the singer performed in an Edith Piaf tribute concert in New York, and contributed music to and played a role in the 2015 film Legend.

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title: Book review: We Have Been Harmonised

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Book review: We Have Been Harmonised

Kai Strittmatter’s ‘We Have Been Harmonised’ documents and analyses the Orwellian path China has taken since Xi Jinping took the reigns of the People’s Republic
The general discourse on China’s future role in the world has begun to shift. What began as a hope that China would reform not just economically but subsequently politically, has evolved into an increasingly unmuted concern of Chinese dictatorship, repression, and influence abroad.

Kai Strittmatter’s We Have Been Harmonised documents and analyses the Orwellian path China has taken since President Xi Jinping (習近平) took the reigns of the People’s Republic. It reads like a dossier, a revelation of conventional and unconventional tactics the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has used to condition and revise their vision of China.

One most striking method was the use of the “Study (Xi) Strong Country” mobile app. The app enabled users to read state media, study Xi’s essays and speeches, send money to friends and take weekly quizzes on “Xi Jinping Thought” to gain points.

A Little Red Book 2.0. Strittmatter’s central argument is that China’s political system, since Mao Zedong (毛澤東), has changed little. Despite the efforts of Deng Xiaoping’s (鄧小平) reforms — term limits for future leaders, opening up of civil society (albeit only until 1989) — China’s political progressivism has made significant regressions since Xi’s rulership. The CCP, while maintaining all its true colors, has thus used technology to enhance their rule and methods of repression.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) recognizes the power embedding technology can have in their ability to control the country; their methods both encourage and discourage “good behavior.”

“The Party doesn’t just use threats; it also buys the loyalty of university teachers,” Strittmatter writes.

Of two friends of his lecturing at a large Beijing university have “received 40,000 Yuan and the other 50,000” as a “maintaining stability bonus.”

The desire for greater power over society is masked by the quest to “harmonize” Chinese society. Borrowing from Confucian rhetoric, Xi has made it his new “China Dream” that the country would be at one with itself — the people, docile and satisfied at the bottom, and the CCP at the top.

The title of the book is a reference to the new language that has developed in China to avoid censorship. When social media censors were blocking terms like “arrested” or “censored,” users who have been threatened by authorities and silenced would state that they have been “harmonized.”

This ‘utopian,’ rather dystopian, vision is made possible not just with the technologies available and being developed. Strittmatter recognizes this and spends the first few chapters of his book establishing the pre-existing methods and psychology that go behind how totalitarian states function and brainwash.

Strittmatter quotes Chinese writer and blogger Murong Xuecun (慕容雪村): “You don’t need to get involved in corruption, it gets involved in you. It follows you everywhere. No one stays clean.”

The CCP leaves all laws ambiguous and their fists ready to clamp down on anything that breathes. Its authority needs criminals to survive, it makes all of China’s people complicit of any crime.

But surely this is not sustainable — an alternative must be developed. In comes the Social Credit System. Your actions monitored and tracked. Every good decision made (defined by the CCP) is rewarded, while every wrong step (once again defined by the CCP) made is punished.


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The Liberty Times Editorial: Keeping a safe distance from China

The cover of Bloomberg Businessweek published on Monday last week reads like a package handling sticker: “Fragile China,” with depictions of four major issues that Beijing would prefer not to deal with — a coronavirus, debt burden, trade dispute and protests — and the added admonition: “Handle with care.”

The magazine is not the only example of global media outlets taunting China and doubting its capabilities, but, in these expressions, the West is also reflecting a realization of its own shameful conduct in the years before COVID-19, when it was led by business interests, but turned a blind eye toward Beijing’s suppression of democracy, freedom and human rights, among other universal values.

Tempted by financial gain, the West became a willing cheerleading squad, rooting on China. In a sense, the rampage of a single coronavirus has exposed the communist empire’s Achilles’ heel, despite its formidable appearance.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has successfully given shape to the mythical “China dream,” with the help of advanced surveillance technology, rapid economic growth and the “grand external propaganda strategy” — to which dozens of billions of yuan are devoted annually — an ascent which is the payoff of 40 years of effort.

China not only plans to compete with the US for global hegemony, but presents its pattern of development as an alternative to developing countries — particularly ones with authoritarian regimes — as a model to learn from.

However, this vast empire — which touts many formulas for success, from which only democracy and free market are missing — finds itself decidedly stretched in its efforts to contain a virus, even though its controls are as stringent as wartime measures and more than half of its citizens are under quarantine.

The virus might swallow up Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) imperial dreams, taking down the edifice of a regime that the CPP is so proud of. Using politics as the highest guiding principle in fighting a disease could dismantle China’s governing system.

Power might become concentrated in the hands of the military. The public could become like the Red Guards during the Cultural Revolution, who held “mass public trials” for ordinary people so that they could strictly control resource distribution and freedom of movement.

Such circumstances might cause China to regress into a military dictatorship, with fierce power struggles breaking out — relegating prosperity and growth to the dustbin of history.

As the outbreak worsens, the world has focused on its impact on the global economy. After all, China has seen the most people infected and the highest death toll, compared with the rest of the world. There is no sign that the virus is about to be contained; its impact is spreading.

China — as the world’s factory and a consumer market of 1.4 billion people — and its problems have a profound effect on the rise and fall of the global economy and trade. While more than half of its citizens are under quarantine and the state’s strict control, consumption has dwindled to fulfilling people’s basic life needs.

Unsurprisingly, lack of consumption has struck a huge blow to the economy of China, where domestic consumer spending contributes more than 50 percent of GDP growth.

Manufacturing in China has looked unpromising since the Lunar New Year holiday. Despite Xi’s call to reign in disease-prevention measures that had “gone too far” and might affect the economy, factories and enterprises across China still show no signs of fully returning to work.

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Virus Outbreak: Coronavirus clouds Apple’s timeline for new iPhones

Travel restrictions to China due to the COVID-19 outbreak have come just as Apple Inc’s engineers usually travel to Asia to perfect the production of new iPhones, former employees and supply chain experts told reporters.

High-volume manufacturing is not scheduled until summer, but the first few months of the year are when Apple irons out assembly processes with partners, such as Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團) outside of Taiwan, two former Apple employees said.

“They probably have one assembly line they’re trying things out on,” said one of the former employees, who asked not to be named discussing production matters.

“Are Apple’s engineers with the Foxconn engineers? If they are, they’re probably making progress, but if they’re not, if they’re quarantined, that could be bad,” they said.

While Apple uses other contract manufacturers, such as Wistron Corp (緯創), to make some iPhones, Hon Hai tends to handle the introduction of new models because its capabilities are the most advanced, supply chain experts said.

Hon Hai, the world’s largest contract electronics maker, delayed reopening key iPhone factories in Shenzhen and Zhengzhou after the Lunar New Year holiday, but hopes to resume half of its Chinese production by the end of this month.

Senior Hon Hai officials who have been working remotely from Taipei since the holiday have not yet returned to China on a large scale, a person with knowledge of the matter told reporters, speaking of company officials generally.

For new iPhone models, the transition from prototype to the assembly of millions of units starts in earnest when the holiday ends, people familiar with the process said.

At that point, Apple has tested numerous prototypes and is in the late stages of what is called engineering validation, in which Hon Hai workers assemble small numbers of devices while engineers from both firms troubleshoot.

If delays occur at this stage, it would eat into the time Apple needs to finalize orders for chips and other parts, almost all of which are custom-made.

Due to the huge volumes needed, “they can’t wait to make component selections,” said Ron Keith, founder of Supply Chain Resources Group, which works with electronics makers such as Alphabet Inc’s Nest.

In March and April, Apple engineers typically work with Hon Hai counterparts to set up new assembly lines and do trial runs, before making final adjustments in April and May.

The aim is to have production lines up and running in June so others can be added progressively to ramp up output.

“It’s very complicated. There are so many variables in the environment, including small factors such as air pollution,” one of the people familiar with the process said.

Anna-Katrina Shedletsky, a former Apple engineer and founder of Instrumental Inc, a start-up focused on factory automation based in Mountain View, California, said that on-the-ground engineering collaboration was critical for new products.

“You can fly those engineers somewhere else, but there’s knowledge about how you make a product in that environment. It’s not that it can’t be taught, but it’s a hard thing to move,” she said.

While supply chain experts and industry insiders have said that Apple still has time to keep its annual iPhone schedule on track, travel restrictions have left it in a tough spot.

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Virus Outbreak: Internet giants fight misinformation about outbreak

Masked revelers take part in the “plague procession” on Saint Mark Square in Venice on Tuesday, during the usual period of the Carnival festivities, which have been canceled following a COVID-19 outbreak in northern Italy.Photo: AFP
As the COVID-19 outbreak spreads globally, the online battle to keep misinformation about the disease is also stepping up.

Google, Facebook and other platforms are struggling to keep ahead of scammers, trolls and others with ill intent who routinely use major tragedies or disasters as opportunities to swindle or manipulate people.

“The public concern about coronavirus is being used as a vehicle to get people to transmit misinformation and disinformation,” University of Washington biology professor Carl Bergstrom said.

Internet companies took part in a meeting last week with the WHO at Facebook offices in Silicon Valley to discuss tactics such as promoting reliable information and fact-checking dubious claims about COVID-19.

“[We must] combat the spread of rumors and misinformation,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom has said.

“To that end, we have worked with Google to make sure people searching for information about coronavirus see WHO information at the top of their search results,” he said.

Google search ranks authoritative sources higher when people are seeking information on health and labels results or news stories that have been fact-checked.

SELLING SNAKE OIL

Ghebreyesus said that social media platforms — including Twitter, Facebook, Tencent and TikTok — have also taken steps to limit the spread of misinformation about the disease.

Facebook said in an online post that it is focusing on claims which, if relied on, could increase the likelihood of someone getting sick or not getting proper treatment.

“This includes claims related to false cures or prevention methods — like drinking bleach cures the coronavirus — or claims that create confusion about health resources that are available,” Facebook head of health Jin Kangxing (金康新) said in the post.

“We will also block or restrict hashtags used to spread misinformation on Instagram, and are conducting proactive sweeps to find and remove as much of this content as we can,” he said.

Bergstrom said that some virus misinformation is “people trying to sell snake oil products,” such as bogus cures or treatments, while others use attention-grabbing deceptions to drive online traffic that yields money from advertising.

Misinformation is also spread by “actors” out to fuel distrust for the establishment in China or foment societal instability overall, Bergstrom said.

“There’s appetite for up-to-date, real-time information,” said Jevin West, coauthor of a book on misinformation with Bergstrom.

“These actors can take advantage of that; things with crazier scenarios are more likely to be clicked on than the report from that doctor at WHO trying to calm down the fears,” West said.

Facebook said that when users seek information related to the virus, the social network would show “educational pop-up” boxes with information considered credible.

Facebook is also giving free ad credits to organizations running coronavirus education campaigns.

Google-owned video sharing platform YouTube has been modifying policies and products for several years to remove harmful content and give priority to authoritative content deemed trustworthy.

“We currently do not allow content promoting dangerous remedies or cures, like videos which claim that harmful substances or treatments can have health benefits,” YouTube said.

YouTube last year began providing links to reliable information, along with videos on “subjects prone to misinformation,” and added coronavirus to that list.

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