Academia Sinica

Use of Genetic Information for Research Project Prompts Privacy Concerns

Brian Hioe
Concerns have been raised regarding the use of genetic information for more than 600,000 patients for an Academia Sinica research project. Consequently, this led to criticisms from legislator Huang Kuo-shu in February that this could potentially be a violation of the Human Biobank Management Act. Namely, according to the Human Biobank Management Act, patients must consent to their data being used and be allowed to withdraw use of the data at any given time. Some patients may not have signed off consent on their data being used but had their information included in the database...
April 2023EnglishPolitics5 min read

Will Taiwanese Academics Be Targeted by the Hong Kong National Security Law?

Brian Hioe
Academic Wu Rwei-ren has been accused by pro-Beijing media in Hong Kong earlier this month of violating the national security law that was passed in June 2020. The law targets what it considers acts of separatism or sedition and was passed by China’s National People’s Congress, circumventing the Hong Kong legislative council. Wu is an associate research fellow at Academia Sinica...
EnglishJanuary 2022Politics6 min read

Academics Call for Academia Sinica Name Change

Brian Hioe
Proposals for Academia Sinica to change its name have been floated several times in the past. For example, the idea came up in March 2020 in the Taiwanese legislature after the Chinese government sought to take credit for a virus reagent developed by Academia Sinica scientists to test for COVID-19. Since then, pan-Green lawmakers have continued calls for a name change on several occasions. The issue was floated again recently, however, after the circulation of a Chinese-language petition by two dozen Academia Sinica researchers...
EnglishOctober 2021Politics5 min read