Reuters
CHICAGO - When Oscar the Cat visits residents of the Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Centre in Providence, Rhode Island, the staff jumps into action -- Oscar can sense within hours when someone is about to die.
In his two years living in Steere's end-stage dementia unit, Oscar has been at the bedside of more than 25 residents shortly before they died, according to Dr. David Dosa of Brown University in Providence. Read More
Today at 9:12 amOprah Winfrey, host and supervising producer of "The Oprah Winfrey Show," earns an estimated $260 million a year, according to a list in TV Guide magazine's July 23 issue. Music producer Simon Cowell, the blunt and often contentious British judge of "American Idol," placed a distant second to Winfrey, with $45 million for his role on the Fox network's smash hit talent show and other projects.
Courtroom chief Judge Judy (Judith Sheindlin), CBS News anchor Katie Couric and "Scrubs" actor Zach Braff round out the top five.
The list breaks down star salaries by category -- prime-time TV, daytime, cable and news with a partial listing below:
TOP FIVE (all salaries are per year)
Oprah Winfrey ("The Oprah Winfrey Show"): $260 million
Simon Cowell ("American Idol"): $45 million
Judge Sheindlin ("Judge Judy"): $30 million
Katie Couric ("CBS Evening News Anchor"): $15 million
Zach Braff ("Scrubs"): $6.3 million
NETWORK PRIME TIME (all salaries are per episode)
William Petersen ("CSI"): $500,000
Charlie Sheen ("Two and a Half Men"): $350,000
Mariska Hargitay ("Law & Order: SVU"): $350,000
Chris Meloni ("Law & Order: SVU"): $350,000
Hugh Laurie ("House"): $300,000
Julia Louis-Dreyfus ("New Adventures of Old Christine"): $225,000
Ellen Pompeo ("Grey's Anatomy"): $200,000
Eva Longoria ("Desperate Housewives"): $200,000
DAYTIME (all salaries are per year)
Judge Judy: $30 million
Bob Barker: $10 million
Maury Povich (per year plus profits): $7 million
Ellen DeGeneres: $5 million
Jerry Springer: $3 million - 4 million
Tyra Banks: $3.5 million
NEWS ANCHORS (all salaries are per year)
Katie Couric ("CBS Evening News" anchor): $15 million
Matt Lauer (NBC "Today" co-anchor): $12 million
Meredith Vieira (NBC "Today" co-anchor): $10 million
By HILLEL ITALIE, AP National WriterNEW YORK - It is the richest going-away party in history.
"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," the seventh and final volume of J.K. Rowling's all-conquering fantasy series, sold a mountainous 8.3 million copies in its first 24 hours on sale in the United States, according to Scholastic Inc.
No other book, not even any of the six previous Potters, has been so desired, so quickly. "Deathly Hallows" averaged more than 300,000 copies in sales per hour — more than 5,000 a minute. The $34.99 book, even allowing for discounts, generated far more revenue than the opening weekend of the latest Potter movie, "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix," which came out July 10.
"The excitement, anticipation, and just plain hysteria that came over the entire country this weekend was a bit like the Beatles' first visit to the U.S.," Scholastic president Lisa Holton said in a statement Sunday.
"This weekend kids and adults alike are sitting on buses, in the park, on airplanes and in restaurants reading 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.' The conversations the readers have been waiting to have for 10 years have just begun."
The numbers are astonishing, but not shocking. "Deathly Hallows" was designed to break records, released Saturday with a first printing of 12 million in the U.S. alone, although Scholastic spokeswoman Kyle Good acknowledged that some stores already were out of copies.
"Our distribution strategy was clearly right on target in order to sell 8.3 million copies in 24 hours," she told The Associated Press. "We are working with retailers to move additional copies to the places they are needed most in the coming days and weeks."
The book's British publisher, Bloomsbury, expects to announce sales figures Monday.
Earlier Sunday, Borders Group Inc. reported that "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" sold 1.2 million copies worldwide in its first day, the biggest single-day number ever for the superstore chain. According to Borders, the previous Potter, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince," sold 850,000 copies on its first day of release in 2005.
Both Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble announced that pre-orders exceeded 1 million. In a truly Beatles-esque moment, seven of the top best sellers on Amazon were Potter-related Sunday, including the audio CD of "Deathly Hallows" and a box set of all seven Potters coming out in September.
"Deathly Hallows" was so popular that Hollywood studio Warner Bros. acknowledged it took away business from "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix," the fifth Potter movie, because fans were too busy.
"They wanted to get that book Saturday, lock themselves in the house and read it, because they didn't want their other friends by Monday telling them who made it and who didn't," said Dan Fellman, Warner Bros.' head of distribution.
Reviews for "Deathly Hallows" have been almost universally ecstatic, and reader enthusiasm apparently intact despite, prerelease "spoilers" that proliferated on the Internet.
"The book was fascinating, and I think I'll have to read it through at least once more before I get the full scope of it — but I thought it had some of her best, most action-packed, funniest moments in it," says Melissa Anelli, Webmaster for the Potter fan site http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org, who said she finished the 759-page book Saturday.
"When I closed the book I was overjoyed and devastated — overjoyed at the story, and the way it had played out, but devastated that the tale was complete," she said. "It did feel like a bereavement, like it was saying farewell to a long-trusted friend."
Last week, some surprised and lucky readers received early deliveries of their Potters, thanks to a glitch by online retailer DeepDiscount.com. Over the weekend, some unfortunate readers complained that their books from Amazon.com had not arrived on Saturday, as promised. Amazon.com spokesman Sean Sundwall would not confirm or deny reports of delays but said Sunday that anyone who did not receive it on time would automatically be refunded the cost of the $34.99 book, which Amazon sold for $17.99.
Potter fan Anna Todd, a film student at the State University of New York's Purchase campus, picked up her book in person at midnight Saturday at the Barnes & Noble in Manhattan's Union Square. Taking naps off and on, she was finished within 24 hours.
"J.K. Rowling does not disappoint; I thought she did brilliantly. It was terrifying; sometimes I was scared to keep reading on. I cried buckets," said Todd, 20, who lamented that "never again will I stay up all night reading a new Harry Potter book, or go to its midnight release party, or invent wild theories about Harry being the Heir of Gryffindor."
"That's it," she said. "It's all over. I feel like I just said goodbye forever to my oldest, dearest friend. All I can do is re-read, and in the future when I have children, I'll get to share these books with them. I look forward to that day."
EDINBURGH, Scotland - Harry Potter's life hangs in the balance. Millions of fans are holding their breath. Meanwhile, his creator is baking a cake — and keeping her secret.
On Saturday, readers around the globe will learn the schoolboy wizard's fate with the publication of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," the seventh and final book in J.K. Rowling's fantasy series. Will Harry defeat his evil nemesis, Lord Voldemort, and restore order to the wizarding world? Will he die in the attempt, as many fans fear — and as Rowling, an expert narrative tease, has hinted?
"Harry's story comes to a definite end in book seven," is all she will say a few days before publication, serving up tea and home-baked sponge cake in her comfortable Edinburgh house. Writing the final words of the saga felt "like a bereavement."
That sounds ominously final. So have we really seen the last of the staff and students of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry?
"Because the world is so big, there would be room to do other stuff," Rowling says carefully. "I am not planning to do that, but I'm not going to say I'm never going to do it."
Rowling (her name rhymes with bowling, rather than howling), looking relaxed in jeans and a sweater, shoulder-length blonde hair stylishly cut, has wildly mixed emotions at leaving behind the character she conjured up during a train journey across England in 1990: a neglected, bespectacled orphan who learns on his 11th birthday that he is a wizard.
She's enjoying the absence of pressure from publishers and fans clamoring for the next installment in Harry's adventures. And she's reveling in the chance to focus on normal life with her husband and three children.
But after finishing the last book, "I felt terrible for a week."
"The first two days in particular, it was like a bereavement, even though I was pleased with the book. And then after a week that cloud lifted and I felt quite lighthearted, quite liberated," she says.
"Finishing is emotional because the books have been so wrapped up with my life. It's almost impossible not to finish and look back to where I was when I started."
It has been an extraordinary journey. When Rowling created Harry Potter, she was a struggling single mother, writing in cafes to save on the heating bill at home. Now, at 41, she is the richest woman in Britain — worth $1 billion, according to Forbes magazine — with houses in Edinburgh, London and the Scottish countryside.
Her first book, "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone," was published in 1997, with a print run of less than 1,000. Rowling's publisher suggested she use gender-neutral initials rather than her first name, Joanne, to give the book a better chance with boys. Lacking a middle name, she took the K from her paternal grandmother, Kathleen.
By the time the book appeared in the United States in 1998 — as "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" — Harry was on his way to becoming a publishing phenomenon.
The six Potter books have sold some 325 million copies in 64 languages, including Latin and Ancient Greek. "Deathly Hallows" has an initial print run of 12 million in the United States alone; more than 2 million copies have been ordered from Internet retailer Amazon.
The novels have produced five movies, mountains of toys, a riot of Internet fan sites and scores of companion books — from academic studies to parodies to pop psychology. A theme park, complete with Hogwarts castle and Forbidden Forest, is to open in Orlando, Fla., in 2009.
The launch of each new book is now accompanied by choreographed chaos and military-level security. No book is sold until a minute past midnight on Saturday.
The series' success has been "a once-in-a-lifetime phenomenon," said Joel Rickett, news editor of trade magazine The Bookseller. "It has brought a new generation to reading — got kids absorbed in huge hefty hardbacks the way they wouldn't have been," he said.
While some critics have dismissed the books as lightweight kiddie fare, others have been impressed by their moral complexity and darkening tone. Death haunts Harry Potter, who was orphaned at the age of 1 when Voldemort killed his parents. He loses his godfather Sirius Black in the fifth book and his beloved headmaster Dumbledore in the sixth. No wonder fans fear for Harry's future.
Rowling was profoundly affected by the death of her own mother from multiple sclerosis in 1990 at the age of 45.
"My mum died six months into writing (the books), and I think that set the central theme — this boy dealing with loss," Rowling says.
And she makes no apologies for exposing children to death.
"I think children are very scared of this stuff even if they haven't experienced it, and I think the way to meet that is head-on," she says. "I absolutely believe, as a writer and as a parent, that the solution is not to pretend things don't happen but to examine them in a loving, safe way."
Rowling says her success has been "the experience of a lifetime." But it also has brought an intense level of pressure, scrutiny and criticism. In the United States, her book tours have attracted thousands of screaming children, but also death threats. Some Christians have called for the books to be banned, claiming they promote witchcraft.
But it's only now that she realizes just how intense the pressure has been at the center of the Harry Potter whirlwind.
"I was very lonely with it," she says. "It's not like being in a pop group, where at least there would be three or four other people who knew what it was like to be on the inside. Only I knew what it was like to be generating this world as it became bigger and bigger and bigger and more and more people were invested in it.
After producing a book a year between 1997 and 2000, Rowling took a break. There was a three-year gap between the fourth book, "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire," and "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix," published in 2003. During the gap, Rowling met and married Neil Murray, a Scottish doctor. They live in Edinburgh with their children David, 4, and Mackenzie, 2, as well as Jessica, Rowling's daughter from her first marriage to a Portuguese journalist.
Rowling now seems reconciled to her success. She says she lives a normal life and is rarely recognized in the street, although her graystone town house on a tree-lined street is protected by an 8-foot stone wall and iron security gates. Like the neighborhood — a leafy literary enclave that's also home to crime novelist Ian Rankin and "No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency" writer Alexander McCall Smith — the house exudes solid affluence, rather than extravagance.
The modestly sized lawn holds a soccer net and a colorful plastic jumble of children's toys. In the tidy family room, are crowded bookshelves, an aquarium, photo albums and board games — the trappings of any middle-class family's life.
Rowling predicts that some of Harry's fans will dislike "Deathly Hallows." But she is proud of it. "The final book is what it was always supposed to be, and so I feel very at peace with that fact," she says.
As for the future, she says she has no plans.
"I can never write anything as popular again," she said. "Lightning does not strike in the same place twice.
"I'll do exactly what I did with Harry — I'll write what I really want to write, and if it's something similar, that's OK, and if it's something very different, that's OK.
"I just really want to fall in love with an idea again, and go with that."
July 19, 2007 - 5:50AMThe European Commission on Wednesday endorsed a Nokia-backed mobile TV standard called DVB-H, saying Europe needed to pick one technology over others and promising to look at ways to mandate its use.
Europe's choice of DVB-H, or Digital Video Broadcasting for Handhelds, was expected. The move will likely prevent rival standards, such as U.S.-based Qualcomm Inc.'s MediaFLO and others developed by Chinese and South Korean manufacturers, from gaining ground in the world's richest market. The European Union has 490 million consumers.
DVB-H is an open standard that can be licensed by anyone. It was developed by European research institutes, has already lined up support from a group of companies headed by handset maker Nokia.
The EU said next year would be crucial in the growth of mobile TV; many people are expected to use their phones to watch the Beijing Olympics and the European Football Championship.
It said choosing one standard would stop market fragmentation such as happened in the Betamax versus VHS video wars of the 1980s.
The EU has taken the same tack before. In the 1980s it pushed GSM (the Global System for Mobile communications) for mobile phones, a move that saw Europeans switch to mobiles much faster than people in the U.S., where regulators did not mandate a single standard.
Now the European Commission, which heads the EU's executive branch, is asking member governments and industry to back DVB-H and its strategy for mobile television in Europe. It said it would come up with draft rules to mandate the use of DVB-H "if necessary and appropriate."
"Europe is today at a crossroads," EU Telecoms Commissioner Viviane Reding said. "We can either take the lead globally - as we did for mobile telephony based on the GSM standard developed by the European industry - or allow other regions to take the lion's share of the promising mobile TV market. Wait-and-see is not an option."
Mobile TV is still at an early stage in Europe. Italy boasts half a million users, while Finland only launched commercial services last month. France and Spain plan to do the same later this year. Mobile TV trials are taking place in Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Ireland, Sweden and the Netherlands.
The European Broadcasting Union - which represents major national public broadcasters such as Britain's BBC and Germany's ARD and ZDF - said it was too soon to adopt one standard for mobile broadcasting.
"It should be up to businesses to define attractive business models that will entice consumers to opt for the standard they like best," it said.
In the U.S., regulators are not mandating a single TV standard for cell phones. Modeo, a unit of cell-tower builder Crown Castle International Corp., has started broadcasting using DVB-H in New York City, but few phones can pick up the signal. Verizon Wireless uses Qualcomm's MediaFLO, and AT&T Inc. is planning to do so.
Poor nations are being sapped of the technology they need to break the poverty trap and catch up with the rest of the world, the UN has said. Unctad is calling for a doubling of aid |
Rather than being luxuries, they are necessities to help economies that are underdeveloped to grow, Unctad argues.
Technology could spur poor nations "to break loose from their poverty trap".
'Lack of balance'
"We do not see the real mainstreaming of technological policies in the [current] poverty reduction strategies," Unctad director general Supachai Panitchpakdi said.
Less than 4% of the World Bank's overall lending has gone to science and technology projects in the last quarter century, Unctad reported.
We're not just arguing for a rebalancing of aid, but also for an increase in aid 
Zelijka Kozul-Wright, Unctad report author
"There is a lack of balance between the governance and social issues and technological issues," Mr Panitchpakdi said.
He also said that the 50 least developed countries (LDCs) needed to build the right environment for technological development.
That, he said, would encourage investment in education and infrastructure. But at the moment only a handful of the Asian LDCs - Bangladesh, Cambodia and Laos - were following the science route, he added.
In addition, foreign aid and investment are not creating strong enough technical knowledge or commercial infrastructure to enable poor nations to develop their own independent technology sectors.
"We're not just arguing for a rebalancing of aid, but also for an increase in aid," said one of the report's authors, Zelijka Kozul-Wright.
"We're calling for a doubling of aid."
Overseas companies have preferred to invest in the minerals and oil industries in Africa, and have transferred little lasting technological knowledge to the poorest nations.
Brain drain
The report also indicated that market forces were having a "very limited" impact on advances science and technology in LDCs.
The better-off developing nations import 12 times as many capital goods, useful in encouraging domestic technological capacity, than LDCs.
The report found that one million of the 6.6 million people in LDCs with higher education were working in industrialised nations.
And a dozen of the LDCs have lost more than one third of their skilled professionals.
Many NetWellness visitors have questions about the significance of their newborn baby's head circumference. But what exactly does this measurement mean?When your baby's head is measured during normal check-ups, health care professionals are monitoring one part of your baby's growth. This measurement is then plotted on standardized growth charts and can give a general idea about your baby's overall growth. For example, a head circumference at the 10th percentile means that out of 100 infant girls, there are only 10 girls with head circumferences smaller than the baby.
Do measurements matter ?: A small head circumference can mean several things. You as parents may tend to have smaller than average (the 50th percentile) head sizes, so that the baby's head measurements simply reflect his or her genetic heritage. However, it may also mean that the baby's brain is not growing well during this crucial period of the brain growth spurt that lasts until 2 years of age. This is called microcephaly, or a failure of brain development.
If the baby is preterm, it would be the ideal that the head circumference moderately exceeds the growth percentiles for weight and length, indicating that her brain was experiencing "catch up growth" after the challenges his or her early life in the hospital.
A large head circumference can also indicate some things. As with smaller head sizes, genetics can also play a role in larger head sizes. In the worst case, a large head size may signal hydrocephalus, or an excessive amount of fluid in the brain's ventricles. This results in compression of the normal brain tissue and impairs the brain's neurological function and growth.
Regarding international adoptions: There is no way at this very early period of life to predict well what the developmental outcomes will be for your adopted child.
If he or she was born prematurely, the mother received little or no prenatal care, if the baby was exposed to drugs or alcohol, the baby was exposed to HIV/AIDS, or suffered from asphyxia at birth or infections as a baby, there is a greater likelihood that a smaller or larger head circumference measurement means that the baby is at greater risk for mental retardation or other developmental delays.
It would be helpful to request a more thorough history of the mother's health and prenatal course and the baby's birth, including Apgar scores.
Apgar scores provide a picture of how vigorous and well the baby was at the time of her delivery. The higher the score, with 10 being perfect, the better. Reviewing this information with a pediatrician might provide you with a better idea of the risk for developmental disability.
Consult your health care professional: Overall, the head circumference cannot be the only measurement taken into consideration when determining a baby's developmental progress. Parents should also look to make sure the baby is reaching his or her developmental milestones, since this is the key indicator of brain/neurologic growth and health.
NetWellness, a collaboration of the University of Cincinnati, Ohio State University and Case Western Reserve University, is a consumer health information Web site. You can ask your questions through the site, www.netwellness.org. Today's answer is by Dr. Mary Gottesman, an Associate Professor in the College of Nursing at The Ohio State University and Ms. Sarah Sauntry, an Assistant Professor of Clinical Nursing at the College of Nursing at the University of Cincinnati.
6 Jul 2007, 0000 hrs IST
,Kounteya Sinha,TNN
11:39AM Friday July 20, 2007Among a group of 2,123 women aged 59 to 60 years old, those who currently smoked were 59 per cent more likely than non-smokers to have undergone early menopause, Dr Thea F Mikkelsen of the University of Oslo and her colleagues found.
For the heaviest smokers, the risk of early menopause was nearly doubled.
However, women who were smokers, but quit at least 10 years before menopause, were substantially less likely than current smokers to have stopped menstruating before age 45.
There is evidence that smoking later in life makes a woman more likely to have early menopause, while smokers who quit before middle age may not be affected, Mikkelsen and her team note in the online journal BMC Public Health.
They investigated the relationship further and determined if exposure to second-hand smoke might also influence the timing of menopause.
The researchers found that nearly 10 per cent of the women went through menopause before the age of 45.
About 25 per cent were current smokers, 28.7 per cent were ex-smokers and 35.2 per cent reported current passive exposure to smoke.
But women who had quit smoking at least a decade before menopause were 87 per cent less likely than their peers who currently smoked to have gone through menopause early.
Compared with married women, widows were also at increased risk of early menopause, as were women who said they were in poor health.
More educated women were less likely to go into menopause early, but they were also less likely to be smokers.
High social participation also cut early menopause risk.
The researchers found no link between coffee or alcohol consumption or passive exposure to smoke and early menopause risk.
"The earlier a woman stops smoking," Mikkelsen and her team conclude, "the more protection she derives with respect to an early onset of menopause."
- REUTERS
Chocolate maker Cadbury faces an unlimited fine for causing a national salmonella outbreak which struck down more than 40 victims.
Birmingham Crown Court was told last week how the city-based confectioner failed to inform the authorities of dozens of tests which showed its processed materials and ready-to-eat products contained the organism.
The court also heard the food poisoning alert followed a decision by Cadbury to change its product testing systems to allow a "tolerance level" of salmonella cells in its chocolate.
Described by prosecutors as utterly inappropriate, the change in 2003 helped Cadbury to cut costs by reducing wastage.
Recorder James Guthrie QC, who will sentence Cadbury, also heard Cadbury's role in the salmonella outbreak was discovered "largely by chance".
Barry Berlin, prosecuting the firm on behalf of Birmingham City Council, told the court on Friday that until 2003 Cadbury had destroyed any chocolate which tested positive for salmonella, adopting an approach that "no amount of testing will make a positive result go away".
Mr Berlin added there was no safe level for salmonella cells in ready-to-eat products and the organism could survive in chocolate for years.
Cadbury has apologised for failing to realise a leaking pipe at its factory in Marlbrook, Herefordshire, posed a risk to health.
It pleaded guilty earlier this year to breaching food and hygiene regulations in connection with the outbreak in the summer of 2006.
More than a million products were recalled by Cadbury on June 23 last year and it has already spent £20 million on improvements, including changes to quality control procedures.
A Friday occurring on the 13th day of any month is considered to be a day of bad luck in English, German, Polish and Portuguese-speaking cultures around the globe. Similar superstitions exist in some other traditions. In Greece or Spain, for example, Tuesday the 13th takes the same role. The fear of Friday the 13th is called paraskavedekatriaphobia (a word that is derived from the concatenation of the Greek words Παρασκευή, δεκατρείς, and φοβία, meaning Friday, thirteen, and phobia respectively; alternative spellings include paraskevodekatriaphobia or paraskevidekatriaphobia) or friggatriskaidekaphobia, and is a specialized form of triskaidekaphobia, a phobia (fear) of the number thirteen.No historical date has been verifiably identified as the origin of the superstition. Before the 20th century, although there is evidence that the number 13 was considered unlucky, and Friday was considered unlucky, there was no link between them. The first documented mention of a "Friday the 13th" is generally listed as occurring in the early 1900's.[1][2] [3]
However, many popular stories exist about the origin of the concept:
The Last Supper, with Judas numbered among the thirteen guests (Jesus plus his 12 apostles), and that the Crucifixion of Jesus occurred Friday. However, Judas was not actually present for the latter part of the meal.
One theory, recently offered in the novel The Da Vinci Code, holds that it came about not as the result of a convergence, but a catastrophe, a single historical event that happened nearly 700 years ago.
The catastrophe was the decimation of the Knights Templar, the legendary order of "warrior monks" formed during the Christian Crusades to combat Islam. Renowned as a fighting force for 200 years, by the 1300s the order had grown so pervasive and powerful it was perceived as a political threat by kings and popes alike and brought down by a church-state conspiracy, as recounted by Katharine Kurtz in Tales of the Knights Templar (Warner Books: 1995):
"On October 13, 1307, a day so infamous that Friday the 13th would become a synonym for ill fortune, officers of King Philip IV of France carried out mass arrests in a well-coordinated dawn raid that left several thousand Templars — knights, sergeants, priests, and serving brethren — in chains, charged with heresy, blasphemy, various obscenities, and homosexual practices. None of these charges was ever proven, even in France — and the Order was found innocent elsewhere — but in the seven years following the arrests, hundreds of Templars suffered excruciating tortures intended to force 'confessions,' and more than a hundred died under torture or were executed by burning at the stake."
Source: Wikipedia
| The New7Wonders organization is happy to announce the following 7 candidates have been elected to represent global heritage throughout history. | |||
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| The Great Wall, China | Petra, Jordan | Christ Redeemer, Brazil | Machu Picchu, Peru |
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| Chichén Itzá, Mexico | The Roman Colosseum, Italy | The Taj Mahal, India | |
The European Food Safety Authority has expressed concern about the use of the colouring E128, also known as Red 2G. Its expert panel on food additives has recommended that the dye should no longer be considered safe for human consumption. The Food Standards Agency is currently investigating whether products containing E128 are on sale in the UK. A spokeswoman for the Food and Drink Federation, which represents UK manufacturers, said the use of Red 2G here was "likely to be minimal". Under current EU food laws, limited amounts of Red 2G are permitted for use in sausages with a minimum cereal content of 6% and in burger meat with a minimum vegetable and/or cereal content of 4%. Cancer in mice However, Red 2G is converted in the body into an oily substance called aniline, which has now been shown in tests on rats and mice to have the potential to trigger cancer. Animals injected with aniline developed cancerous tumours. In a statement the EFSA panel said: "Given new scientific evidence, it cannot be excluded that aniline's carcinogenic potential is due to damage to the genetic material of the cells. "It is therefore not possible to determine a level of intake for aniline which may be regarded as safe for humans. "The Panel therefore concluded that Red 2G should be regarded as being of safety concern." The EFSA, which is re-examining the scientific evidence on all food colourings, has passed its findings to the European Commission. Red 2G is already banned in a number of countries, including Japan. |
It is not possible to determine a level of intake for aniline which may be regarded as safe for humans 
This post was written by Laura Smith on 6 July, 2007 (06:39) | All News, Society and Culture, Archeology & Antiquities News 2,294 Views
Most of the official Seven Wonders of the World have disappeared. Most people probably couldn’t even name them. Because of this, Bernard Weber, a Swiss-Canadian filmmaker and aviator decided that a new seven wonders list should be established for existing pieces of architecture. He created the site new7wonders.com to allow people to begin to vote on which pieces of architecture around the world are worthy of these top seven positions. Since then, 70 million votes have been cast narrowing the choices down to 21. This weekend, the winning list will be revealed on Saturday, July 7. So far, a shoo-in is the Taj Mahal because of a national campaign in India. The ranking of the top seven will be kept a secret. The contenders include:
Acropolis - Athens, Greece
Alhambra- Granada, Spain
Angkor -Cambodia
Chichen Itza -Yucatan, Mexico
Christ Redeemer - Rio de Janiero
Colossuem - Rome
Easter Island Statues -Chile
Eiffel Tower -Paris
Great Wall - China
Hagia Sophia- Istanbul
Kiyomizu Temple -Kyoto, Japan
Kremlin/St. Basil-Moscow
Machu Picchu -Peru
Neuschwanstein Castle- Germany
Petra - Jordan
Pyramids of Giza - Egypt
Statue of Liberty -New York
Stonehenge -England
Sydney Opera House -Australia
Taj Mahal -Agra, India
Timbuktu -Mali
The original Seven Wonders of the world were chosen by Antipater of Sidon who based his list on travelers such as Herodotus and Callimachus. They included:
The Great Pyramid of Giza - Cairo, Egypt
The Hanging Gardens of Babylon - east bank of the River Euphrates, Baghdad, Iraq
The Statue of Zeus at Olympia- 150 km west of Athens, Olympia, Greece
The temple of Artemis at Ephesus- ancient Ephesus, Izmar, Turkey
The Mausoleum at Halicarnassus- ancient Halicarnassus, Bodrum, Turkey
The Colossus of Rhodes -Rhodes, Greece
The Lighthouse of Alexandria - ancient Pharos, Alexandria, Egypt
Visit: NEW SEVEN WONDERS OF THE WORLD
Emily Yoffe was online July 5 to chat with readers about this story. Read the transcript.
Over the course of three days recently, I had 23 head-to-toe physicals from 23 second-year students at the Georgetown School of Medicine. I was the first person these would-be doctors had ever fully examined on their own. Some were shaking so violently when they approached me with their otoscopes—the pointed device for looking in the ear—that I feared an imminent lobotomy. Some were certain about the location of my organs, but were stymied by the mechanics of my hospital gown and drape. And a few were so polished and confident that they could be dropped midseason into Grey's Anatomy.
Georgetown allowed me to be a "standardized patient"—that is, a trained person who is paid $15 an hour to be poked and prodded by inexperienced fingers, so that med students can learn communication and examination skills before they are sicced on actual sick people. In Human Guinea Pig, I try things you might want to do but don't have the time or opportunity. However, even if you had the time or opportunity, you probably wouldn't want to be examined by 23 medical students.
The concept of the standardized patient has been around for decades, but only in recent years have medical schools made training with them a regular part of their curriculum. I talked to a 50-ish physician friend about my experiences, and he said when he was in medical school and it was time for the first rectal/genital exam, the students were told to pair off and examine each other. "So, do you pick someone you like, or someone you don't like?" he recalled. "Either way, it's lose-lose."
Now there are standardized patients trained for genital duty (they're called GUTAs, for genitourinary teaching associates), but I signed up for something less invasive. Mine was the simplest possible assignment. I was to sit on the edge of a padded table in one of those awful, flapping hospital gowns, in a room equipped with recording devices in the ceiling. Each doctor had 30 minutes to conduct a standard head-to-toe physical: from my vital signs, to my nerve function, to my reflexes, etc. Then I was to go to a computer and check off whether they'd done all 45 parts of the exam ("Palpated for fremitus," "Auscultated carotids"), and write my comments on their bedside manner.
There are some obvious things you hope no doctor ever says to you, but on this assignment, I discovered there are a few others:
"I have to admit I have some butterflies."
"I've never felt anyone's liver."
"I'm so sorry! Are you all right?"
I actually was charmed by the students who acknowledged their nervousness, and it was adorable the way most of them would stop after finishing one body part, look upward as if at a floating textbook, mumble some mnemonics, then continue the exam. Before he left the room, Dr. K (although they can't yet call themselves "doctor," I'll call them that here; they're so eager, they deserve it) ran his eyes over me and said, "Let me check if I forgot any major systems. That would be bad." But nervousness in a doctor can be dangerous. Dr. F had a relationship with her instruments that reminded me of Edward Scissorhands. She apologized profusely after stabbing me with the otoscope. MORE..
By BINAJ GURUBACHARYA, Associated Press Writer Tue Jul 3, 4:26 PM ET
KATMANDU, Nepal - A 10-year-old Nepalese girl was stripped of her title as a living goddess because she traveled overseas to promote a documentary about the centuries-old tradition, an official said Tuesday.
Sajani Shakya had her status revoked because she broke with tradition by leaving the country, said Jaiprasad Regmi, chief of the government trust that manages the affairs of the living goddesses.
Sajani is among several "Kumaris," or living goddesses, in Nepal, and as one of the kingdom's top three, is forbidden from leaving the country. However, last month she went to the United States and other countries to promote a British documentary about the living goddesses of the Katmandu Valley. She is to return to Nepal this week.
"We have begun the process to search for a new Kumari," said Regmi, adding that a task force would determine suitable candidates.
Ishbel Whitaker, director of the film "Living Goddess" said she was shocked and saddened by this news and would make sure the girl's education was provided for. "The rule of not being able to leave was never a rule before.... Nobody ever said the Kumari can't travel" she said by telephone from London.
Whitaker said they filmed in Bhaktapur for a year. "We had been speaking with people we felt were authorities, and now these others are claiming they are," she said.
The film crew consulted anthropologists, the head priests of Sajani's temple and her parents, the director said. And she said the Nepalese Embassy helped arrange Sajani's trip to the U.S.
Living goddesses are worshipped by both Hindus and Buddhists. The girls are selected between the ages of 2 and 4 after going through several tests.
They are required to have perfect skin, hair, eyes and teeth, they shouldn't have scars or wounds, and shouldn't be afraid of the dark. They always wear red, pin up their hair in topknots and a "third eye" is painted on their forehead.
Devotees touch the girls' feet with their foreheads, the highest sign of respect among Hindus in Nepal.
During religious festivals the girls are wheeled around on a chariot pulled by devotees. Living goddesses usually keep their title until their first menstruation.
The main Kumari lives a sequestered life in a palatial temple in the capital, Katmandu. She has a few selected playmates and is allowed outside only a few times a year for festivals.
Others like Sajani are allowed to stay at home, attend regular school and take part in festivals.
The government last year announced a monthly pension of $40 for serving and retired Kumaris. Previously, the main Kumari received only a gold coin during an annual festival and the other girls received whatever was offered by devotees.
Nepalese folklore holds that men who marry a former Kumari will die young, and so many girls remain unmarried and face a life of hardship.
Critics have said the tradition violates both international and Nepalese laws on child rights. But the film director said the Kumari tradition can be modern as well.
"Sajani seemed to be a great example of how the tradition can move into the modern age," Whitaker said. She said she made the film because the living goddess tradition is beautiful and worth capturing before it disappears.
Associated Press Writer Carley Petesch contributed to this article from New York.
LONDON (Reuters) - Despite their fearsome reputation, piranhas are wimps that gather in large shoals to protect themselves from predators, scientists said on Monday.
Rather than aggressive killers, research shows piranhas are omnivorous scavengers, eating mainly fish, plants and insects, Anne Magurran of Scotland's University of St Andrews said.
"Previously it was thought piranhas shoaled as it enabled them to form a cooperative hunting group. However, we have found that it is primarily a defensive behavior," she said.
Piranhas face constant attack from predators including river dolphins, caiman -- a relative of the crocodile -- and bigger fish, such as the giant piracucu.
"Their cautious behavior is crucial to avoid being eaten," Magurran said.
Her work with the Mamiraua Institute in Brazil shows how shoal sizes increase in relation to predation risk, especially when water levels in the Amazon basin are low, giving piranhas less room to escape attack.
The research is featured at the Royal Society's summer science exhibition in London.
LOS ANGELES - Hollywood's box office record books have been transformed.
The sci-fi adventure "Transformers" had an unprecedented Tuesday haul of $27.4 million in its official debut, beating a record of $15.7 million set last year by "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest."
"It's the biggest Tuesday ever," said Mike Vollman, spokesman for Paramount, which released "Transformers" along with fellow Viacom Inc. unit DreamWorks. "It's playing very broadly. It's the kind of summer movie that's drawing families and we're very excited for its progress going into the rest of the weekend."
Directed by Michael Bay and based on the Hasbro toys that debuted in the 1980s, "Transformers" chronicles a war between two factions of giant shape-shifting robots that bring their battle to Earth. The human cast costarring alongside the computer-generated robots includes Shia LaBeouf, Tyrese Gibson, Jon Voight, Josh Duhamel and John Turturro.
"Transformers" opened Tuesday in 4,011 theaters nationwide. It also played in preview screenings at 3,050 theaters starting at 8 p.m. Monday, bringing in $8.8 million.
"They had great preview numbers and it's an incredible total for a Tuesday, which is just not known as a big box office day," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office tracker Media By Numbers. "The timing on this movie was perfect, with the holiday in the middle of the week. This film has six days plus a preview to stretch its legs."
"Transformers" is positioned to join the ranks of this summer's blockbusters, "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End," "Spider-Man 3" and "Shrek the Third," all of which have surpassed or are about to cross the $300 million mark domestically.
A brisk Fourth of July week would help Hollywood recover from a monthlong downturn that followed a huge start to summer in May.
"This could be the movie that transforms the summer back into the blockbuster we were hoping it would be," said Dergarabedian.
NEW YORK: Q. You have sent out hundreds of résumés and have received only automated responses, and not one request for an interview. Is that common, and what can you do about it?
A. Welcome to the Internet black hole. That is how Mark Mehler, co-founder of CareerXroads, describes the new universe of job seeking.
With the rise of online company job sites, along with job boards like CareerBuilder and other niche sites, it is easier than ever to apply for a job. At the same time, it is much harder for a résumé to be noticed.
Ten years ago, you made copies of your résumé - perhaps on gorgeous creamy bond stationery - and after seeing a job that was advertised in your local newspaper, sent it out, along with a cover letter, in a manila envelope.
Now you can go to your computer and find out about jobs all around the world, and apply for them by touching the send button. Unfortunately, so can everyone else. MORE...
BORDEAUX: When I first heard of something called vinotherapy I asked my doctor to explain. He laughed and made the universal heavy-drinking gesture - head tossed back and thumb in mouth. "That's the only vinotherapy I know," he said.
I decided to dig deeper, though, and discovered it has nothing to do with drinking. It's a French process of applying the essence of grape pits to the body to slow the aging of the skin. The grape is the strongest source of plant-based antioxidants.
At the origin of vinotherapy is Les Sources de Caudalie, a spa in southwest France, so I decided drop in and have a closer look. Within a day I had an appointment for a grape juice "barrel bath" and special "crushed cabernet scrub," a kind of rough massage.
Mathilde Thomas, founder and vice president of Caudalie, promised me that the scrub, despite its name, was the most popular treatment offered. "The skin is the first thing people notice about us," she said, "and we have discovered ways to protect it."
I arrived with a bad case of the jitters, brought on in part by the uncomfortable prospect of getting undressed in front of strangers. But the staff was used to such reticence and cooed soothingly as they led me to a private room with an enormous tub, its bottom and sides pierced with about 50 power-jet holes of various sizes.
Once in place, a vinotherapist emptied a large vial of liquefied grape pits, skins and pulp into the water and flipped a switch. I was now awash in exfoliants - my skin battered by high-powered, pounding jets of fluid, painless but still a shock to the system.
The grape solution is a byproduct of the wine press. Before the Caudalie people came along, this sludge was disposed of as waste. But with the help of a Bordeaux University chemist, they discovered in the 1990s that the seeds contain a rich polyphenol, an antioxidant that retards the aging of skin. The Caudalie team managed to stabilize the polyphenols, and they had a product.
I was now in the Caudalie Spa's recovery room, a sunlit deck that overlooks hundreds of acres of Smith Haut Lafitte vines. At this time of year the vineyards are at their most restful - lush foliage in a range of deep greens. The grapes are just starting to form.
A cup of herbal tea helped calm me down. After a quarter of an hour, another vinotherapist, Alexandrine, led me to a private massage room. She invited me to hang up my robe, leaving me standing there in a thong.
"I've never done this before," I explained.
"Relax. Just lie down," she said.
As I settled in, she showed me something that might have come from the kitchen: a bowl of honey, oil and shells of raw grape seeds.
Without further warning, she attacked my legs with a handful of her potion, raking the seeds across my flesh with impressive power. "This will be good for you," she promised. Yeah, I thought, now I see why they call it the "cabernet crush."
After half an hour, Alexandrine said, "you may rinse now," indicating the adjacent shower stall. I looked down and was surprised to see hundreds of black seeds clinging to the honey all over my body.
"This is not pretty," I managed.
Alexandrine smiled and indicated the shower stall again.
Once dressed I could see the effects of the treatment. My skin had lost its sandpaper texture and most of the wrinkles. I gradually stopped shaking.
The next morning at home I found two grape seeds on my bathroom floor. The following day there was another one. Then they stopped. Maybe it's time to go back.
Michael Johnson is a journalist based in Bordeaux.
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