Rapid tests for deadly superbugs that are spreading in the community are urgently needed, an expert is warning. Professor Richard James of the Centre for Healthcare Associated Infections at Nottingham University says Britain is vulnerable to the types of MRSA. The toxin-producing strains, known as PVL, are spread outside of hospitals via skin-to-skin contact and appear as sores which look like insect bites. Existing tests take more than two weeks, yet the bug can kill in a day. Until recently, MRSA (methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus) has been a problem within hospitals, affecting mainly the frail and elderly. But the bug is escaping hospital wards to cause severe disease among otherwise healthy people in the wider community, particularly in the US, but also in the UK. ... http://news.bbc.co.uk censor News |
Editor - 10:15:00 01-21-07 |
Killing of Children Prompts Latest Police Push Against Entrenched Los Angeles Gangs |
A 14-year-old girl was killed by Hispanic gang members who police say were targeting blacks. A 9-year-old girl died after being hit by a stray bullet as gang members exchanged shots near her home. A cop was wounded in a gunbattle with a suspected gangster. The soaring violence is prompting police and politicians to promise one of the toughest crackdowns against gangs in city history. "This is the monster, this is what drives people's fears," said Deputy Chief Charles Beck, who oversees a South Los Angeles district where gang-related crime jumped 24 percent during the year ending in November. However, the effort has met skepticism in the city that has an estimated 700 gangs with 40,000 members about four for every police officer and that gave birth to some of the nation's most notorious gangs, including the Crips, Bloods and Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13.... http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=2811421
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Editor - 10:12:00 01-21-07 |
Peru official says cocaine output is growing. We have been losing this war for over fifty years and no end in sight |
Peru has reduced and stabilized illegal coca leaf planting areas over the past few years, but yields from some farms have doubled and cocaine output soared due to a lack of funds to fight the lucrative business. Peruvian Interior Minister Pilar Mazzetti told Reuters in an interview over the weekend local drug traffickers in the world’s second-biggest coca leaf producer have switched to pure cocaine production from raw coca paste. “Things have changed, evolved. Four, five years ago they were producing more paste, but now we are discovering more laboratories in the growing areas and more and more cocaine hydrochloride,” she said. “It used to be 80 percent paste, now it’s 80 percent cocaine, and very high quality cocaine.” The density of coca plants has nearly doubled in some places and plants yield more cocaine alkaloid. “We are managing to maintain the number of hectares under coca leaf stable, but the density and quality are definitely improving—... http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13116743/
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Editor - 09:44:00 01-21-07 |
Newt Gingrich says he would run as ‘last resort’ |
First, Newt Gingrich said he would run for president in 2008 only if no other Republican emerged as a clear front-runner. Now, the former House speaker says he will run only as a “last resort.” His assessment came in response to a question by Chris Wallace, host of “Fox News Sunday.” “You sound as if you think about running for president as a last resort, not as a first resort?” Wallace asked. “Exactly,” Gingrich answered. “I mean, nobody’s ever said it quite that way, but you’re right.” Gingrich said he first hoped to influence the presidential race by providing candidates in both parties with his “solutions” to problems such as health care, energy, education, national security and immigration. “If, in that process, it becomes necessary to run, then I’ll run,” Gingrich said. If you had heard the interview that Gingrich made on 9/11 you sure wouldn’t want this Idiot in any position of power. If anyone has a copy of that interview, I would sure like to have it... http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16738860/
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Editor - 09:35:00 01-21-07 |
Airline pilot is stricken after takeoff, dies |
The pilot of a Continental Airlines flight became ill after takeoff and was later pronounced dead after the plane made an emergency landing Saturday, a company spokeswoman said.The 210 passengers on the flight, which departed from Houston, Texas, were never in danger and the co-pilot landed the plane safely, Continental spokeswoman Macky Osorio said.The airline said only that the pilot suffered a "serious medical problem." Continental believes the pilot died of natural causes, Osorio said. The pilot's name was not released.... http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/01/20/pilot.dies.ap/index.html?eref=rss_us
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Editor - 09:25:00 01-21-07 |
Troops in as bombs strike Baghdad |
More than 3,000 US troops have arrived in Baghdad, the first deployment of extra forces promised for the Iraqi capital by Bush. As the deployment began, the US military said four soldiers and one marine had been killed in the restive western province of Anbar. It took to 22 the number of US deaths in Iraq on Saturday - one of the worst days for US troops since the invasion. In the lastest violence in Baghdad seven people were killed in two blasts. A bomb on a minibus killed six people in Karrada, a mostly Shia district. The second bomb hit central Baghdad. In the south of the country, a British soldier was killed by a roadside bomb near the city of Basra. Meanwhile the political movement headed by radical Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr has said it is ending a two-month boycott of Iraq's parliament and government. The boycott was called in protest at a meeting between Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and President Bush and to press for the withdrawal from Iraq of US troops.... http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6283817.stm
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Editor - 09:23:00 01-21-07 |
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post The Good, The Bad and The Ugly |
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