Greater Taichung police on Tuesday said they have launched an investigation into a report that gamblers are betting tens of millions of dollars on the life expectancy of terminally ill cancer patients.
The investigation comes after the Chinese-language Next Magazine reported that gamblers in Greater Taichung — including the families and doctors of cancer patients — are placing bets as high as NT$1 billion (US$34.5 million) on when a patient will die.
The report said the trend is served by betting stations disguised as non-profit organizations, where punters are paid three times their bets if the targeted patients die between one and six months of a prediction.
“We’ve been looking at the media report,” a Taichung police officer said, declining to provide details.
Punters are allowed to visit cancer patients before placing their bets, which start at a minimum of NT$2,000, losing to the bookies if their selected patients die within a month, the magazine said.
The expose identified one road, which it claimed had more than 10 betting shops on it and is reportedly now known as the “death gambling street.”
“These offices are the betting stations, even though they can hardly be judged from their appearances,” the magazine said.
A staff member at one of the suspected organizations contacted by China Television Co (中視) denied that it was a front for a betting station and said the magazine’s report was exaggerated.
He said the group helped poor families pay for funerals that they would otherwise be unable to afford.
A Chinese freighter that allegedly snapped an undersea cable linking Taiwan proper to Penghu County is suspected of being owned by a Chinese state-run company and had docked at the ports of Kaohsiung and Keelung for three months using different names. On Tuesday last week, the Togo-flagged freighter Hong Tai 58 (宏泰58號) and its Chinese crew were detained after the Taipei-Penghu No. 3 submarine cable was severed. When the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) first attempted to detain the ship on grounds of possible sabotage, its crew said the ship’s name was Hong Tai 168, although the Automatic Identification System (AIS)
An Akizuki-class destroyer last month made the first-ever solo transit of a Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force ship through the Taiwan Strait, Japanese government officials with knowledge of the matter said yesterday. The JS Akizuki carried out a north-to-south transit through the Taiwan Strait on Feb. 5 as it sailed to the South China Sea to participate in a joint exercise with US, Australian and Philippine forces that day. The Japanese destroyer JS Sazanami in September last year made the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force’s first-ever transit through the Taiwan Strait, but it was joined by vessels from New Zealand and Australia,
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SECURITY: The purpose for giving Hong Kong and Macau residents more lenient paths to permanent residency no longer applies due to China’s policies, a source said The government is considering removing an optional path to citizenship for residents from Hong Kong and Macau, and lengthening the terms for permanent residence eligibility, a source said yesterday. In a bid to prevent the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from infiltrating Taiwan through immigration from Hong Kong and Macau, the government could amend immigration laws for residents of the territories who currently receive preferential treatment, an official familiar with the matter speaking on condition of anonymity said. The move was part of “national security-related legislative reform,” they added. Under the amendments, arrivals from the Chinese territories would have to reside in Taiwan for
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