Several countries in the Asia-Pacific region have expressed an interest in Taiwan’s achievements in military medicine — a branch of medicine that attends to the needs of military personnel — a senior military official said on Saturday.
Officials from several countries — including Taiwan’s diplomatic and non-diplomatic allies — last year and this year visited the Tri-Service General Hospital and other military medical centers in the nation, the source said on condition of anonymity.
They expressed an interest in the construction, planning, structure, organization and operations of Taiwan’s national-level military medical centers, as well as the allocation of advanced medical resources, the source said.
The officials said they would continue to push for exchanges and cooperation through visits and discussions, the source added.
Last year, Ministry of National Defense Medical Affairs Bureau Director-General Chen Jiann-torng (陳建同), who was then deputy director-general, led a Taiwanese delegation to the Asia-Pacific Military Health Exchange in Singapore, the source added.
The delegation presented Taiwan’s achievements in military medicine, as well as several important studies, at the exchange, the source said.
The results and studies received a positive response from other nations’ representatives, who sought opportunities to visit Taiwan, the source said.
Cohosted by China and the US, this year’s exchange is to be held in Xian in September, the source said.
While it would be inappropriate for Taiwanese military personnel to attend this year’s exchange, representatives from several countries who attended past exchanges told Taiwan that this would not affect the potential for the nation to engage in exchanges with these countries, the source said.
Former minister of national defense Feng Shih-kuan (馮世寬) last year praised the efforts of military medical units that participated in international medical exchanges.
At a meeting at the end of last year, he listed their achievements, including participating in the Singapore exchange, the International Conference on Disaster and Military Medicine and the World Dental Congress; hosting the first Taipei International Military Medicine Forum; and signing memorandums of understanding with five medical universities, including the Uniformed Services University in Bethesda, Maryland.
In related news, Taiwan is to participate in the US Navy’s Pacific Partnership humanitarian relief training mission in the Solomon Islands next month.
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