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More food waste, more disposal charges

A resident disposes of food waste at his apartment in Songpa-gu, southern Seoul, on Sunday, using a radio frequency identification (RFID) system that calculates the weight of waste automatically and imposes fees based on the data. / Korea Times photo by Hong In-ki New disposal system causes confusionBy Nam Hyun-woo, Baek Byung-yeul, Park Ji-wonSmart waste disposal has always been a big issue in a small but densely populated country like Korea, where around 50 million people live.The country has recently implemented a new waste disposal system. Last Sunday, the municipal and provincial governments started to charge residents for food waste disposal based on weight.Currently, 129 out of 229 local governments participate in the pilot project. The new system is expected to reduce the amount of annual food waste by up to 20 percent, saving local authorities about 5 trillion won ($44 billion) in waste treatment cost, according to the Ministry of Environment.However, residents are not yet accustomed to the new system and are confused about how it works exactly.How the fo

Jun 4, 2013By Baek Byung-yeul
More food waste, more disposal charges

Korean adoptees

Dear Dr. P,This is a very interesting corner and I am happy to make your acquaintance. I have a question related to Korean adoption and would like to hear your opinion. I was wondering what Koreans generally think of Korean adoptees and their basic perspectives or thoughts about this issue.There seems to be a prejudice or stigma to Korean adoption and recently a friend of mine told me that generally Koreans don’t like Korean adoptees, because it reminds them of a shameful or sad past. I hate to think this is true. I’d just like to know the perspective of Koreans on the issue of Korean adoption.I recently read in this one book, where a teenager met an adoptee abroad and felt sad and a bit strange. I have received various reactions, both positive and negative, but the ones I really appreciate are ones that don’t feel sorry for me — feeling sympathy or pity - but just treat me as human like them with sincere affection and interest in my situation. Perhaps this is a bit hard to answer but I wonder why Korea is still sending Korean babies abroad to be adopted. Ther

May 31, 2013
Korean adoptees

Q&A on deadly ticks

Health authorities stress preventive measures against deadly ticks, explaining the possibility of infection is low.By Yoon Ja-youngAs the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) has, so far, confirmed two deaths from severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome (SFTS), concern is growing over the disease transmitted by blood-sucking ticks for which there is no vaccine yet.The virus spread by the Haemaphysalis longicornis tick causes fever, vomiting or diarrhea, and also can cause multiple organ failures resulting in death. It has killed more than a hundred people in China and Japan during the past few years, and the confirmation of deaths shows that Korea is not safe. One need not worry too much, however, because the health authorities say the possibility of infection is low and the fatality rate is lower than first presumed — around 6 percent according to recent data. The health authorities advise focusing on preventive measures.The following are frequent Q&As about the ticks, addressed to and answered by the KCDC.Q. I was bitten by a tick, but I am showi

May 31, 2013By Yoon Ja-young
Q&A on deadly ticks

Additional factors affecting tooth decay

By Hong Kee-sangThe last article discussed how the teeth, the decay-causing bacteria, the sugar content of children’s diet and the amount of time the three are allowed to be together affect the development and progress of tooth decay.But there are additional factors. Some of them play big roles, others small. By acting in combination, though, they influence the process in no small way. Let’s discuss them one by one. Saliva Everybody has it, but quality and quantity differ from person to person.Some people have stickier saliva. Instead of acting to rinse away debris, it acts like syrup to retain the food particles in the vicinity of the teeth — leading to a heightened likelihood of tooth decay occurring.Some people secret less saliva than others, leading to less capacity to coat/protect the surface of teeth and wash away debris. Of importance in children with regards to this is medication and mouth breathing. Lots of children these days have allergies, rhinitis, asthma, atopic dermatitis, you name it. Many of them take medication for extended periods. However, m

May 31, 2013
Additional factors affecting tooth decay

GE Healthcare to expand R&D facility in Korea

Laurent Rotival, second from left, president and CEO of GE Healthcare Korea, shovels with Choi Young-chun, third from left, general manager of Ultrasound Korea at GE Healthcare, Akihiko Kumagai, fourth from left, president and CEO of GE Healthcare Asia Pacific, and Karl-Heinz Lumpi, fifthfrom left, general manager of Women’s Health Ultrasound for GE Healthcare, at a groundbreaking ceremony for the expansion of GE Healthcare’s ultrasound R&D and manufacturing facility in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, Thursday. / Courtesy of GE Healthcare KoreaBy Yoon Ja-youngGE Healthcare in Korea is expanding its R&D and manufacturing facility for ultrasound technology in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, intending to make it the biggest ultrasound facility in the world.The company held a ground breaking ceremony on Thursday, for the $9.1 million project, which is expected to be completed by February of next year. The production of ultrasound devices from the expanded site is expected to double by 2017.“This investment is a true reflection of GE Healthcare&rsqu

May 31, 2013By Yoon Ja-young
GE Healthcare to expand R&D facility in Korea

Warning signs on working moms' joints

By Song Sang-hoEven though people say that women’s status in their jobs or at home has improved a lot, most working moms are still complaining of hard work and weary lives. According to a survey of 1,000 working moms in their 30s and 40s, about 84 percent said it was hard for them to juggle between work and childrearing.Apart from such mental stress, they also have a lot of physical stress including joint pain. A mom trying working and childrearing needs to keep in mind that the damage to her joints can progress more quickly.While sitting in front of a computer all day in an office and then taking care of basic household affairs such as the laundry, washing dishes, and cleaning, working moms naturally use their wrists a lot, and it may lead to pain. When you have swollen fingers or pins and needles in your fingers, as a nerve in the wrist is damaged or pressed, you can suspect “carpal tunnel syndrome.” When these symptoms are serious, you can even feel numbness in your fingers.Besides, as women have smaller knee joints and their muscles around the joints are weaker

May 31, 2013
Warning signs on working moms' joints

In search of ideal hospital care

By Jane HanA place that pregnant women all visit often, besides the bathroom, is the hospital. The visits become more frequent and thorough as the weeks progress. I first started out with a routine monthly checkup, but now at 34 weeks, a mandatory three-times-a-week visit is almost feeling like a full-time job.I’m ordered to have more frequent checkups because my twin pregnancy is categorized as high-risk. But having to haul myself to the hospital so often is definitely a challenge at the size I’m at right now.So what happens during the visits? Twice a week, the babies are given fetal non-stress tests to monitor their heartbeats and I’m given contraction stress tests to measure any early contractions.The remaining checkup is with my doctor to examine my overall condition, discuss questions and concerns, and just chat about anything; really, anything. This is when I find myself fascinated with hospitals in the United States.My pregnancy began in Korea so I went to a well-established OB/GYN hospital in Seoul for the first 16 weeks. I was pretty satisfied with the over

May 31, 2013
In search of ideal hospital care

Healthline

Medipost posts record-high salesMedipost turned to a surplus in the first quarter, with sales increasing to a record-high.The stem cell biotechnology company announced Thursday that it recorded 7.5 billion won in sales for the first quarter, up 16 percent from the previous quarter and the biggest quarterly sales ever. Its operating profit stood at 180 million won, turning to a surplus from a 50 million won loss the previous quarter.“Despite increases in cost of overseas clinical trials of stem cell based treatments and domestic operations, growing sales of Cartistem, a stem cell treatment for knee cartilage defects, the cord blood storage business and health supplements put the company in the black,” a spokesman for the company said. Green Cross Lab, Ewha sign MOUGreen Cross Reference Lab under Green Cross Corp. signed an MOU with Ewha Womans University to set up research and development infrastructure for brain sciences. The two parties will cooperate to fuse research into the brain with other academic fields such as medicine and pharmaceuticals, economics, business

May 31, 2013By Yoon Ja-young

'Healing' food

“Easy Yakseon Recipes” by Wang Hye-moon introduces dishes to balance the yin and yang of our bodies.By Yoon Ja-youngKoreans have a long-held belief in “Yaksikdongwon,” which means “medicine and food have the same root.” Good food will heal you. “Yakseon” or medicinal dishes that are believed to heal or prevent disease are based on such a belief. Ingredients for Oriental medicine as well as ordinary healthy ingredients are used to balance the yin and yang of our bodies.From next week, The Korea Times will feature three dishes from “Easy Yakseon Recipes” by Wang Hye-moon, a doctor of Korean Oriental medicine.A member of a third-generation Chinese family that migrated to Korea from Shandong province, she said she was given medicinal herbs rather than medicine when she was ill during childhood. That was natural for her family as her father was also a doctor of Oriental medicine. Her mom applied the theory of Yakseon to the family’s daily dishes, and Wang believes those helped her grow up healthy.Wang talked of Ya

May 31, 2013By Yoon Ja-young
'Healing' food

(239) How do names influence our destiny?

By Janet Shin One of a saju master’s important tasks is to name a person or a company. It can be for a baby or an adult. They are bynames, pen names including renames. In order to make an appropriate and lucky name, a practitioner should read one’s saju to analyze the energy structure and how each star is composed. It is to protect and replenish the feeble energy and add the missing one subject to the weakness and strength of saju elements. For example, if a baby was born with the wood day master without any water element, we should add the fluent water energy to his or her name.For a baby, one may want just a happy life in overall factors. In Korean custom, there is a special ceremony on one year’s birthday to present threads, pencils and money and to watch which item the baby grabs. It is to wish the baby’s longevity, academic achievement and wealth as three major fortunes. Nowadays parents put some modernized items such as a judge’s gavel, microphone, stethoscope or golf balls to pray for a promising future. But in general, they just wish a harmo

May 30, 2013
(239) How do names influence our destiny?
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