News You Might Have Missed: Cancer, Cars, and Internet Connections
Beijing has been dealing with some heavy issues – cancer rates are rising and traffic accidents are continuing to hit close to home. Meanwhile, the subway expansion is continuing while would-be car owners are looking at ways around the license lottery. And does anyone really know what the deal is with airport Wi-Fi?
The fact that October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month seems to have jumpstarted the media’s attention on cancer in Beijing. New figures suggest that lung and breast cancer rates have gone up by 56 and 127 percent, respectively, between 2000 and 2009. Pancreatic cancer rates are also rising. All three cancers are linked to pollution and unhealthy lifestyles, with white-collar lifestyles under particular scrutiny when it comes to pancreatic cancer. None of the reports mention the increase in testing and detection in recent years as having an effect on the numbers. China Daily chose to offer a dubious correlation between the increase of pancreatic cancer and Steve Jobs, stating: “The country has seen a huge jump in pancreatic cancers – deemed the king of malignant tumors – medical experts warned following the death of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs from the disease.”
Travel statistics about the October holiday were not been limited to simple crowd numbers. One worrying trend from the holiday was the number of fatal traffic accidents that have raised concerns about the standards and quality controls taken in regards to public transportation, especially after recent train and subway accidents.
In less somber transportation news, don’t plan on hopping on Line 8 anytime soon. The Beijing line used primarily by tourists heading to the Bird’s Nest and Water Cube will be closed until the end of the year while construction work is done on the expansion of the line. Line 8 will extend further north after this period, but its southern extension – which includes stops at Gulou, Nanluogu Xiang, Wangfujing, and Qianmen – isn’t expected to open until 2013.
For Beijingers who are tired of waiting on the license plate lottery, a new option is available for those looking to buy a car. The suspicious new option allows people to “rent” plates when buying a car. The contracts state that the buyers own the car even though the plate and car remain in the seller's name. Once the buyer wins their own plate in the lottery, they are supposedly allowed to then transfer the car over to their name. While this process may appeal to anyone looking to purchase (and drive) a car without a wait, lawyers are suggesting that, even with a contract, this still leaves buyers in jeopardy of losing the car which they will technically never own, and thus lack any legal recourse or appeal.
A bit of good news for drivers came last week when Sinopec Group and CNPC gas stations announced a petrol price drop of RMB 0.24 would take effect. This reflects the first drop in 16 months and leaves us wondering if this will have any effect on the taxi two-kuai surcharge.
Apparently, China Unicom users will soon be able to access airport Wi-Fi simply by entering their phone number on the airport’s Wi-Fi page and receiving a password by text message. No one in the Beijinger office knows exactly what the deal is with the airport Wi-Fi. China Mobile users already get online this way, while others only know of getting codes from airport machines. Will Wi-Fi become easily accessible to everyone? And will it even work once we get those codes?
Photos: Dreamstime, China Daily
