Study: Vitamins don’t lower heart risks in men

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Multivitamins might help lower the risk for cancer in healthy older men but do not affect their chances of developing heart disease, new research suggests.

Two other studies found fish oil didn’t work for an irregular heartbeat condition called atrial fibrillation, even though it is thought to help certain people with heart disease or high levels of fats called triglycerides in their blood.

The bottom line: Dietary supplements have varied effects and whether one is right for you may depend on your personal health profile, diet and lifestyle.

“Many people take vitamin supplements as a crutch,” said study leader Dr. Howard Sesso of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. “They’re no substitute for a heart-healthy diet, exercising, not smoking, keeping your weight down,” especially for lowering heart risks.

The studies were presented Monday at an American Heart Association conference in Los Angeles.

A separate analysis released in connection with the meeting showed that at least 1 in 3 baby boomers who are in good shape will eventually develop heart problems or have a stroke. The upside is that that will happen about seven years later than for their less healthy peers.

The study is “a wake-up call that this disease is very prevalent in the United States and even if you’re doing a good job, you’re not immune,” said Dr. Vincent Bufalino, a Chicago-area cardiologist and spokesman for the American Heart Association.

The findings came in an analysis of five major studies involving nearly 50,000 adults aged 45 and older who were followed for up to 50 years.

The research was published online by the Journal of the American Medical Association, along with the vitamin paper and one fish oil study.

Multivitamins are America’s favorite dietary supplement. About one-third of adults take them. Yet no government agency recommends their routine use for preventing chronic diseases, and few studies have tested them to see if they can.

A leading preventive medicine task force even recommends against beta-carotene supplements, alone or with other vitamins, to prevent cancer or heart disease because some studies have found them harmful. And vitamin K can affect bleeding and interfere with some commonly used heart drugs.

Sesso’s study involved nearly 15,000 healthy male doctors given monthly packets of Centrum Silver or fake multivitamins. After about 11 years, there were no differences between the groups in heart attacks, strokes, chest pain, heart failure or heart-related deaths.

Side effects were fairly similar except for more rashes among vitamin users. The National Institutes of Health paid for most of the study. Pfizer Inc. supplied the pills and other companies supplied the packaging.

The same study a few weeks ago found that multivitamins cut the chance of developing cancer by 8 percent — a modest amount and less than what can be achieved from a good diet, exercise and not smoking.

Multivitamins also may have different results in women or people less healthy than those in this study — only 4 percent smoked, for example.

The fish-oil studies tested prescription-strength omega-3 capsules from several companies in two different groups of people for preventing atrial fibrillation, a fluttering, irregular heartbeat.

One study from South America aimed to prevent recurrent episodes in 600 participants who already had the condition. The other sought to prevent it from developing in 1,500 people from the U.S., Italy and Argentina having various types of heart surgery, such as valve replacement. About one third of heart-surgery patients develop atrial fibrillation as a complication.

Both studies found fish oil ineffective.

___

AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner in Chicago contributed to this report.

___

Online:

Heart Association: http://www.heart.org

JAMA: http://www.jama.ama-assn.org

Vitamin facts: http://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/MVMS-QuickFacts/

Dietary advice: www.dietaryguidelines.gov

___

Marilynn Marchione can be followed at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP .

Health News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Everything you wanted to know about voting machines

Ever since punch-card voting machines produced the "hanging chads" that led to the Florida recount in the 2000 election, Americans have been looking for new and more reliable technology to use on Election Day.

One result: The Help America Vote Act of 2002, which authorized $3.9 billion in federal funds for trading in punch-card and lever systems with either e-voting or optical scan systems. The act also stipulates that all polling places should make available a handicap-accessible voting device.

But while the country, for the most part, has moved on from the older, more unreliable machines, the new models present their own set of challenges. From shadowy conspiracy theories to genuine concerns about glitches, here's what you need to know about the machines that are supposed to make democracy work.

What kind of machines are used, and where?

Sixty percent of the country now supplies voters with optical scanners. To use them, voters shade in their choices on paper ballots (similar to how they would take an SAT test) before feeding it to the machines. These optical scanners, while not exactly a brand-new technology, are the state-of-the-art for both their accuracy in processing votes and their security against tampering.

But the same cannot always be said for the alternative, e-voting equipment (direct-recording electronic machines, or DREs), which is used in about 25 percent of the country. These are lined up in places like Georgia, Maryland, Utah, Nevada, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Indiana and Texas.

E-voting machines come in three variants: push-button machines sporting a keypad; LCD touch-screens; and machines that use a rolling wheel to select and confirm a vote onscreen. All of these register votes on an electronic ballot. The absence of a paper trail, which is preserved by the optical scanners, has caused concerns since the inception of the machines.

VerifiedVoting.org provides more specifics on the history and different forms of voting technology, including a map showing the brand of election equipment for different states.

Does anyone still use punch-card or lever systems?

Four counties in Idaho still use punch-card ballots, while none in the country has used lever machines since 2010.

What are some of the examples of problems with e-voting machines?

In 2004, electronic votes were wiped from machines in New Jersey and North Carolina. But the much more ominous worries over the limits and liabilities of e-voting became clear in 2008, when a study by Princeton University revealed how easy it would be to hack into the Sequoia brand of e-voting machines (used chiefly in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Louisiana) to steal votes.

More disturbing is this quote from Roger Johnston, a computer science expert leading a subsequent test on Diebold AccuVote e-voting machines just last year: "I've seen high-school science fair projects that are more sophisticated than what is needed to hijack a voting machine." His crash course in vote-jacking went as follows: The equipment was hacked by inserting a very inexpensive homemade device into the voting machine, which could be remotely controlled from afar. In practice, when the voter attempted to mark her e-ballot, the hacker could intercept and alter the vote from one party to the other.

Despite these widely reported studies, as well as HBO's 2006 documentary "Hacking Democracy," there has not yet been any effort to address these sorts of problems with either the Diebold machines or the smaller malfunctions of e-voting machines more broadly. (It is, of course, also true that there have been problems with fraud and machine error with more traditional forms of voting technology.)

The software for the e-voting machines is proprietary, which means that only the companies that manufacture them have access to their design, which they have kept from examination through extended legal battles.

What's with stories about Tagg Romney owning voting machines?

In a tight election, even the most tenuous connections can be spun quickly into a web of conspiracy. That's not to say that there aren't genuine links between very enthusiastic Mitt Romney donors and Hart InterCivic, a large supplier of voting machines in Ohio—but the theories attempting to prove that Tagg Romney, the Republican nominee's eldest son, owns Ohio voting machines overstep the boundaries of available evidence.

As Rick Ungar reported in Forbes, two Hart InterCivic board members made direct donations to the Romney campaign; furthermore, several directors of H.I.G. capital, which owns Hart, are major money-raisers for the campaign. (Some of them were in the room during Romney's infamous "47 percent" remarks.)

But there is no evidence that Tagg Romney's private equity firm, Solamere Capital, invests, owns or controls voting machines made by InterCivic. The closest one gets by following the money is to find Solamere investing in H.I.G.'s medical fund, BioVentures, a wholly separate fund, as reported by Eugene Kiely and Lucas Isakowitz at Factcheck.org.

What will superstorm Sandy's impact be on voting in the Northeast?

In the back of people's minds, Sandy's effect on voting in the Northeast has been a quiet but pressing concern. As Thad Hall, a University of Utah political scientist and researcher for the Voting Technology Project, told the Associated Foreign Press, "Some voters will literally not be able to vote because they will have been evacuated from their local polling place and there is no provision for remote voting."

The voting machines themselves will be left operating on batteries, not an encouraging prospect as Election Day drags on longer in areas where debris and destruction have complicated the process and organization.

In New Jersey, the state is allowing residents to combat the aftermath of the storm by voting through absentee ballots by email or fax. And state officials in New York have said that residents may be granted an extra day to vote if Tuesday's turnout is below 25 percent.

Read More..

Newspaper discloses new Cameron text messages

LONDON (AP) — A British lawmaker says he’s asked the country’s media ethics inquiry to consider newly disclosed text messages sent between Prime Minister David Cameron and Rebekah Brooks, the ex-chief executive of Rupert Murdoch‘s British newspaper division.

The Mail on Sunday newspaper on Sunday published two previously undisclosed messages exchanged between the pair, who are friends and neighbors.

Brooks is facing trial on conspiracy charges linked to Britain’s phone hacking scandal, which saw Murdoch close down The News of The World tabloid.

In one newly disclosed message, Cameron thanked Brooks in 2009 for allowing him to borrow a horse, joking it was “fast, unpredictable and hard to control but fun.”

Opposition lawmaker Chris Bryant has asked a judge-led inquiry scrutinizing ties between the press and the powerful to examine the messages.

Europe News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Google's Android software in 3 out of 4 smartphones

'},"otherParams":{"t_e":1,".intl":"US"},"events":{"fetch":{lv:2,"sp":"1197280665","ps":"LREC,MON","npv":true,"bg":"#FFFFFF","em":escape('{"site-attribute":"_id=\'048ccb9d-45dd-354e-b2f5-74c9b098ca33\' sensitivity=\'0\' rs=\'lmsid:a0770000002GZ5iAAG\' ctype=\'fn_news;News\' ctopid=\'1499989;1550500;2299500;1507989;1506989;1542500;1550000;1507489\' can_suppress_ugc=\'1\' content=\'no_expandable;ajax_cert_expandable;\' ADSSA"}'),"em_orig":escape('{"site-attribute":"_id=\'048ccb9d-45dd-354e-b2f5-74c9b098ca33\' sensitivity=\'0\' rs=\'lmsid:a0770000002GZ5iAAG\' ctype=\'fn_news;News\' ctopid=\'1499989;1550500;2299500;1507989;1506989;1542500;1550000;1507489\' can_suppress_ugc=\'1\' content=\'no_expandable;ajax_cert_expandable;\' ADSSA"}')}}};var _createNodes=function(){var nIds=_conf.nodeIds;for(var i in nIds){var nId=nIds[i];var dId=_conf.destinationMap[nIds[i].replace("yom-","")];n=Y.one("#"+nId);if(n)var center=n.one("center");var node=Y.one("#"+dId);var nodeHTML;if(center && !node){nodeHTML=_conf.nodes[nId];center.insert(nodeHTML);};};};var _prepareNodes=function(){var nIds=_conf.nodeIds;for(var i in nIds){var nId=nIds[i];var dId=_conf.destinationMap[nIds[i].replace("yom-ad-","")];n=Y.one("#"+nId);if(n)var center=n.one("center");var node=Y.one("#"+dId);if(center && node){center.set("innerHTML","");center.insert(node);node.setStyle("display","block");};};};var _darla;var _config=function(){if(YAHOO.ads.darla){_darla = YAHOO.ads.darla;_createNodes();};};var _fetch=function(spaceid,adssa,ps){
if (typeof(ps)!='undefined')
_conf.events.fetch.ps = ps;if(typeof spaceid != "undefined") _conf.events.fetch.sp=spaceid;adssa = (typeof adssa != "undefined" && adssa != null) ? escape(adssa.replace(/\"/g, "'")) : "";_conf.events.fetch.em=_conf.events.fetch.em_orig.replace("ADSSA", adssa);if(_darla){_prepareNodes();_darla.setConfig(_conf);_darla.event("fetch");};};Y.on("domready", function(){_config();});;var that={"fetch":_fetch,"getNodes":_conf.nodes,"getConf":_conf};return that;}();/* Backwards compatibility - Assigning the latest instance to the main fetch function */YUI.PhotoAdsDarla.fetch=YUI.PhotoAdsDarla.photoslightboxdarla.fetch;
});
Y.later(10, this, function() {YAHOO.namespace('Media.Social').Lightbox = {};
});
Y.later(10, this, function() {Y.Media.Article.init();
});
Y.later(10, this, function() {new Y.Media.AuthorBadge();
});
Y.later(10, this, function() {new Y.Media.Branding();
});
Y.later(10, this, function() {Y.on("load", function () {
YUI.namespace("Media.SocialButtons");

var instances = YUI.Media.SocialButtons.instances || [],
globalConf = YAHOO.Media.SocialButtons.conf || {},
vplContainers = [];

Y.all(".ymsb").each(function (node) {
var id = node.get("id"),
conf = YAHOO.Media.SocialButtons.configs[id],
instance;

if (conf) {
instance = new Y.SocialButtons({
srcNode: node,
config: Y.merge(globalConf, conf.config || {}),
contentMetadata: conf.content || {},
tracking: conf.tracking || {}
});
vplContainers.push(
{
selector: "#" + id,
callback: function(node) { instance.render(); instance = conf = id = null; }
});

if (conf.config && conf.config.dynamic) {
instances.push(instance);
}
}
});

Y.Global.Media.ViewportLoader.addContainers(vplContainers);
YUI.Media.SocialButtons.instances = instances;
});
});
Y.later(10, this, function() {if (!Y.Media) {

return;

}

Y.Media.boba_lightbox_module_targets = Y.Media.boba_lightbox_module_targets || {};

Y.Media.boba_lightbox_module_configs = Y.Media.boba_lightbox_module_configs || {};

Y.Media.boba_lightbox_module_dataset = Y.Media.boba_lightbox_module_dataset || {};

Y.Media.boba_lightbox_module_whitelist = Y.Media.boba_lightbox_module_whitelist || {};


Y.Media.boba_lightbox_module_targets['lightbox7b074328ba80f0e906939c94408a9450'] = {"lightboxId":"5beaad150e48e74b27ba30e31680d570","pivotId":"8c9c5d48-1003-38e5-8cba-ae9828acbda7"};


Y.Media.boba_lightbox_module_dataset['5beaad150e48e74b27ba30e31680d570'] = {"spaceid":"1197280665","total":1,"photoby":"Photo By","xhrtype":"slideshow","videoconf":{"autoplay":true,"continuousPlay":true,"mute":false,"volume":"1.00","lang":"en-US","site":"news","region":"US","jurisdiction":"US","YVAP":{"accountId":"145","playContext":"default"},"pageSpaceId":"1197280665","comscoreC4":"US News","comscoreC6":"","showEmbedCode":true,"showShareUrl":true,"expName":"MediaArticleRelatedLightbox","expType":"inline","apiEnv":"prod"},"slideshow_id":null,"slideshow_title":null,"slideshow_title_baked_html":null,"slideshow_desc":null,"slideshow_rev":null,"slideshow_plink_vita":null,"photos":[{"type":"image","url":"http:\/\/l3.yimg.com\/bt\/api\/res\/1.2\/V9xx2l9jTi4JXe9pC3c9TQ--\/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9aW5zZXQ7aD0zMDA7cT03OTt3PTQ1MA--\/http:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en_us\/News\/Reuters\/2012-11-02T201400Z_1_CBRE8A11JVJ00_RTROPTP_2_GOOGLE.JPG","width":450,"height":300,"uuid":"8c9c5d48-1003-38e5-8cba-ae9828acbda7","caption":"Attendees gather at the Android developer sandbox during the Google I\/O Conference at Moscone Center in San Francisco, California June 28, 2012. REUTERS\/Stephen Lam","captionBakedHtml":"

Attendees gather at the Android developer sandbox during the Google I\/O Conference at Moscone Center in San Francisco, California June 28, 2012. REUTERS\/Stephen Lam","date":"Fri, Nov 2, 2012 4:16 PM EDT","credit":"Reuters","byline":"\ufffd Stephen Lam \/ Reuters","provider":"Reuters","photo_title":"Attendees gather at the Android developer sandbox during the Google I\/O Conference in San Francisco","pivot_alias_id":"attendees-gather-android-developer-sandbox-during-google-o-photo-200645766","plink":"\/photos\/attendees-gather-android-developer-sandbox-during-google-o-photo-200645766.html","plink_vita":"http:\/\/news.yahoo.com\/photos\/attendees-gather-android-developer-sandbox-during-google-o-photo-200645766.html","srchtrm":"Attendees gather at the Android developer sandbox during the Google I\/O Conference in San Francisco","revsp":"","rev":"21e4e7c0-252a-11e2-a7d5-a4e5802e1c8f","surl":"http:\/\/l.yimg.com\/bt\/api\/res\/1.2\/aXNb.Hjk6iN0EEJTYGBVkg--\/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9aW5zZXQ7aD01NjtxPTc5O3c9ODQ-\/http:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en_us\/News\/Reuters\/2012-11-02T201400Z_1_CBRE8A11JVJ00_RTROPTP_2_GOOGLE.JPG","swidth":84,"sheight":56}]};

Y.Media.boba_lightbox_module_configs['5beaad150e48e74b27ba30e31680d570'] = {"spaceid":"1197280665","ult_pt":"story-lightbox","darla_id":"","images_total":0,"xhr_url":"\/_xhr\/related-article\/lightbox\/?id=048ccb9d-45dd-354e-b2f5-74c9b098ca33","xhr_count":20,"autoplay_if_first_item_is_video":true};
});
Y.later(10, this, function() {new Y.Media.RelatedArticle({count:"2",start:"1",
mod_total:"10", total:"0",
content_id:"048ccb9d-45dd-354e-b2f5-74c9b098ca33",
spaceid:"1197280665",
related_count:"-1"
});
});
Y.later(10, this, function() {(function(d){
d.getElementsByTagName('head')[0].appendChild(d.createElement('script')).src='http://d.yimg.com/oq/js/csc_news-en-US-core.js';
})(document);
});
Y.later(10, this, function() {
if(!("Media" in YAHOO)){YAHOO.Media = {};}
if(!("ugcrate" in YAHOO.Media)){YAHOO.Media.ugcrate = {};}
if(!("Media" in Y)){Y.namespace("Media");}
YAHOO.Media.ugcrate.ratings_fd3182a74fc12b41f9c3ecb0597e49b1 = new Y.Media.UgcRate({"context_id":"1b05b3fc-d288-43a3-bf0f-c88b56b4f5a8","sCrumb":"","containerId":"yom-sentimentrate-fd3182a74fc12b41f9c3ecb0597e49b1","rateDimensions":"d1","appLang":"en-US","sUltSId":"1197280665","sUltProperty":"news-en-US","sUltCampaign":"","sUltPlatform":"ugcwidgets","sUltIntl":"US","sUltLang":"en-US","selfPageUrl":"http:\/\/news.yahoo.com\/googles-android-software-3-4-smartphones-200645049--sector.html?_esi=0","artContentId":"048ccb9d-45dd-354e-b2f5-74c9b098ca33","sUltQstnTxt":"What do you think of the iPad Mini?","artContentTitle":"Google\\'s Android software in 3 out of 4 smartphones","artContentDesc":"SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Three out of every four smartphones sold in the third quarter featured Google Inc\\'s Android mobile operating system, as the gap between Google and Apple Inc-based phones widened further, according to a new research report. Shipments of Android-based smartphones made by Samsung, HTC and other vendors nearly doubled in the third quarter, reaching 136 million units, according to industry research firm IDC. The strong sales boosted Android\\'s share of the worldwide smartphone market to 75 percent, from 57.5 percent in the year-ago period. ...","sUltBucketId":"test1","sUltSection":"sentirating","sUltBeaconUrl":"","sUltRecordPageviews":"1","sUltBeaconEnable":"1","serviceUrl":"\/_xhr","publisherContextId":"","propertyId":"2fcd79b5-b3a3-333e-b98e-722536a6698f","configurationId":"435db9ee-c55e-3766-b20d-c8ad3ff889d1","graphId":"","labelLeft":"Yawn..","labelRight":"I need to have it!","labelMiddle":"","itemimg":"http:\/\/l.yimg.com\/a\/i\/ww\/met\/yahoo_logo_us_061509.png","selfURI":"","aggregateRatingCount":"12363","aggregateReviewCount":"0","leftBlocksNum":"10605","rightBlocksNum":"1758","leftBlocksPerCent":"86","rightBlocksPerCent":"14","ugcrate_apihost":"api01-us.ugcl.yahoo.com:4080","publisher_id":"news-en-US","yca_cert":"yahoo.ugccloud.app.trusted_proxies","timeout_write":"5000","through_proxy":"false","optionStats":"{\"s1\":8257,\"s2\":645,\"s3\":509,\"s4\":617,\"s5\":577,\"s6\":1758,\"s7\":0,\"s8\":0,\"s9\":0,\"s10\":0}","l10N":"{\"FIRST_TO_READ\":\"You are first to read this. Share your feelings and start a conversation.\",\"SHARE_YOUR_FEELINGS\":\"You too can share your feelings and start a conversation!\",\"HOW_YOUR_FRIENDS_THINK\":\"Share your response with your friends on Facebook\",\"PRE_SHARE_MSG\":\"Your Facebook friends on Yahoo! can see how you responded. To share your response on Facebook, click on the Facebook share option.\",\"START_THE_CONVERSATION\":\"Share\",\"THANKS_FOR_SHARING\":\"Your response has been shared with your friends on Facebook\",\"POLL_HEADER\":\"SOCIAL SENTIMENT\",\"SERVER_ERROR\":\"Oops there seems to be some error, please try again later\",\"LOADING\":\"Loading...\",\"SHARE_AFTER_COMMENT\":\"Your response has been shared on Facebook.\",\"UNDO\":\"Undo\",\"UNIT_PEOPLE\":\"People\",\"NUM_PEOPLE_DISAGREE\":\"disagree with your opinion.\",\"READ_MORE_TEXT\":\"Read what they have to say.\",\"SLIDER_THUMB_WORDING_BEFORE_VOTING\":\"WHAT DO YOU THINK?\",\"SLIDER_THUMB_WORDING_VERB_BEFORE_VOTING\":\"DRAG\",\"SLIDER_THUMB_WORDING_THANKS_VOTING\":\"Thanks for voting\",\"NUM_PEOPLE_ANSWERED\":\" 12,363 people have responded\",\"ONE_PERSON_ANSWERED\":\" 1 person has responded. Your response will be seen by your Facebook friends on Yahoo!\",\"TWO_PEOPLE_ANSWERED\":\" 2 people have responded. Your response will be seen by your Facebook friends on Yahoo!\",\"NUM_PEOPLE_ANSWERED_AND_SHARED\":\" 12,363 people have responded. Your response will be seen by your Facebook friends on Yahoo!\",\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s1\":8257,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s2\":645,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s3\":509,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s4\":617,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s5\":577,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s6\":1758,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s7\":0,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s8\":0,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s9\":0,\"NUM_PEOPLE_RATED__s10\":0}","fbconfig":"{\"message\":\"undefined\",\"name\":\"undefined\",\"link\":\"\",\"source\":\"\",\"picture\":\"http:\\\/\\\/l.yimg.com\\\/a\\\/i\\\/ww\\\/news\\\/2011\\\/09\\\/27\\\/yahoo-tc.jpg\",\"description\":\"\",\"captionLeft\":\"undefined\",\"captionRight\":\"undefined\",\"app_id\":\"196660913708276\",\"redirect_uri\":\"\\\/_xhr\\\/ugcratefbredirect\\\/\"}","template_id":"LONG_SLIDER_SOUTH","obj_id":"ratings_fd3182a74fc12b41f9c3ecb0597e49b1","opt_count":"6","opt_color1":"","opt_color2":"","template_html":"

Read More..

What election? Sandy’s the big story on ‘SNL’

NEW YORK (AP) — You wouldn’t have known it was the Saturday before the election on “Saturday Night Live.”

Sure, Mitt Romney, played by Jason Sudeikis, made a quick appearance on “Weekend Update,” but otherwise much of the focus was on Superstorm Sandy — and Mayor Michael Bloomberg‘s sign-language interpreter, Lydia Callis.

The real Callis has gained some pop-culture popularity with her enthusiastic interpreting of Bloomberg’s words. She was back at the mayor’s side at Saturday’s briefing in New York and was played on “SNL” by Cecily Strong. The mayor — played by Fred Armisen — thanked Callis for bringing “pizazz” to her job.

Hosting Saturday’s show was comedian and TV star Louis C.K. He said in the monologue of New York City: “We’re still standing.”

President Barack Obama didn’t appear on the show.

Entertainment News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

NYU hospital outpatients back Monday, emergency room closed

NEW YORK (Reuters) – New York University‘s Langone Medical Center plans to reopen its doctors’ offices and out-patient procedure and testing sites on Monday but its emergency department remains closed after the hospital lost power due to Hurricane Sandy.

The hospital, which was forced to evacuate its patients on Monday night, said on Sunday that it had no update yet on when it would be able to start taking in over-night patients again or when its emergency department would be back up and running.

In a statement issued Friday night, the hospital said that patients with previously scheduled appointments should call 866-724-1830 to confirm the location of their appointments.

The Hospital for Joint Diseases is still open and The Center for Muscuskelatal Care and the Clinical Cancer Center will also reopen on Monday November 5, according to the hospital.

However it advised patients of the Clinical Cancer Center and the Stephen D. Hassenfeld Children‘s Center for Cancer and Blood Disorders who want to reach their doctor to call 800-400-8566 in the interim.

The Langone Medical Center evacuated its 215 patients, including critically ill infants, and closed its doors on Monday night after its back-up power generator failed because of flooding its basement.

(Reporting By Sinead Carew; Editing by Marguerita Choy)

Health News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Florida's I-4 corridor: The mother road of swing voters

By Bob Sacha and Maisie Crow

Interstate 4 bisects the center of America's most notorious swing state, running 132 miles from Tampa, through Orlando and ending near Daytona Beach. Fifty-five percent of Florida voters live in the I-4 corridor. It is often where elections are decided in a state that has frequently switched sides, voting for Republicans seven times and Democrats three times in the past 10 elections, and voting for the winning presidential candidate 90 percent of that time.

For the final installment of our Road Trip video series for Campaign 2012, Yahoo News headed to Florida in search of the exotic, perhaps mythical, undecided voter. Here are three of our conversations.

'I have been registered to vote for seven years, and I have never voted.'

In a state filled with colorful characters, Eve Banks, 25, entertains many of them at the Mons Venus club in Tampa. She also travels extensively for her work as an exotic dancer. Eve Banks is a stage name: "I don't want girls from my sorority looking me up online," she says.

"I'm living a version of the American dream," she told Yahoo News. "It's not like the white picket fence, but I do have the dogs and I do have the husband. And I have everything I want. It's just kind of a different way of achieving it."

In the 2012 presidential election, Banks will be voting for the first time, casting a ballot for Barack Obama, she says, because of his support for women. "I generally don't care about politics because I feel like little old me does not make a difference," she said. "But this year I think is a lot different than previous years because of what's at stake right now.

"There was a lot of discrimination against women, believe it or not, not even that long ago really if you think about it. And that'll all change if we don't put the right person in the position," Banks said. "No woman wants a government to control her body or her choices."

'It has gotten pretty ugly between the two. I'm not sure I would want to be a part of it.'

Lloyd Parker, 33, hasn't decided whether he is going to vote. He was working for a land development company in Lake Tahoe in Nevada until business started to slow down. His best friend lured him to Florida to become an entrepreneur by starting the Savage Race, an obstacle race in the mud. We hung out with him during their third race in Dade City.

"The Savage Race is a four- to six-mile mud obstacle course," Parker said. "It's timed. Twenty to 25 military-style obstacles that challenge you in many different ways. And afterward it's a fun gathering with live music and a party atmosphere."

Parker called Florida a Savage Race of sorts for Obama and Mitt Romney: "It is everywhere. It seems to be all over Facebook, everything. Maybe that has turned me off a little bit. That it's just been too much of back and forth and negativity, and it probably pushed me away a little bit.

"I have not been following it very much lately," he told Yahoo News. "In the last month I have been extremely busy with this course. I'm out on a ranch with no cable."

'I think somebody that's been in the farming business as long as we have—I don't think we should have to pay any inheritance tax.'

When Dave Black, 73, started in the citrus-farming and ranching business 42 years ago in Clermont, he stood on his 22 acres and saw fruit trees everywhere. Now his property is down to 14 acres, and it is hemmed in by new housing developments on three sides.

"We've got enough houses," Black told Yahoo News. "I mean we should leave a little open space."

Black is voting for Romney because of his opposition to the inheritance tax, in the hope that he can pass his property to his children undivided and tax-free.

"The Electoral College, I don't care for," he said. "I want the people to decide, not this state or that state. You know, Bush, the first election, he won on electoral votes. He didn't win on popular votes. Gore beat him on popular votes. So, that's wrong. That's just my opinion."

Bob Sacha is a multimedia producer, a documentary filmmaker, a photojournalist and a teacher. Maisie Crow is a documentary photographer, a filmmaker and a visual storytelling teacher. Earlier this year, Bob Sacha and Zach Wise traveled to Nevada to talk to Hispanics about the presidential election. In October, they talked to small-business owners along Colorado's Colfax Avenue. In July, Bob Sacha and Miki Meek traveled to Northern Virginia to talk to Mormons about what a President Romney would mean to them. In March, they drove Ohio's I-71 and talked to Republicans before Super Tuesday.

Read More..

Syria army quits base on strategic Aleppo road

BEIRUT (Reuters) – The Syrian army abandoned its last base near the northern town of Saraqeb after a fierce assault by rebels, further isolating the strategically important second city Aleppo from the capital.

But in a political setback to forces battling to topple President Bashar al-Assad, the United Nations said the rebels appeared to have committed a war crime after seizing the base.

The opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Friday government troops had retreated from a post northwest of Saraqeb, leaving the town and surrounding areas “completely outside the control of regime forces”.

It was not immediately possible to verify the reported army withdrawal. Authorities restrict journalists’ access in Syria and state media made no reference to Saraqeb.

The pullout followed coordinated rebel attacks on Thursday against three military posts around Saraqeb, 50 km (30 miles) southwest of Aleppo, in which 28 soldiers were killed.

Several were shown in video footage being shot after they had surrendered.

“The allegations are that these were soldiers who were no longer combatants. And therefore, at this point it looks very likely that this is a war crime, another one,” U.N. human rights spokesman Rupert Colville said in Geneva.

“Unfortunately this could be just the latest in a string of documented summary executions by opposition factions as well as by government forces and groups affiliated with them, such as the shabbiha (pro-government militia),” he said.

Video footage of the killings showed rebels berating the captured men, calling them “Assad’s dogs”, before firing round after round into their bodies as they lay on the ground.

Rights groups and the United Nations say rebels and forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad have committed war crimes during the 19-month-old conflict. It began with protests against Assad and has spiraled into a civil war which has killed 32,000 people and threatens to drag in regional powers.

The mainly Sunni Muslim rebels are supported by Sunni states including Saudi Arabia, Qatar and neighboring Turkey. Shi’ite Iran remains the strongest regional supporter of Assad, who is from the Alawite faith which is an offshoot of Shi’ite Islam.

STRATEGIC BLOW

Saraqeb lies at the meeting point of Syria’s main north-south highway, linking Aleppo with Damascus, and another road connecting Aleppo to the Mediterranean port of Latakia.

With areas of rural Aleppo and border crossings to Turkey already under rebel control, the loss of Saraqeb would leave Aleppo city further cut off from Assad’s Damascus powerbase.

Any convoys using the highways from Damascus or the Mediterranean city of Latakia would be vulnerable to rebel attack. This would force the army to use smaller rural roads or send supplies on a dangerous route from Al-Raqqa in the east, according to the Observatory’s director, Rami Abdelrahman.

In response to the rebels’ territorial gains, Assad has stepped up air strikes against opposition strongholds, launching some of the heaviest raids so far against working class suburbs east of Damascus over the last week.

The bloodshed has continued unabated despite an attempted ceasefire, proposed by join U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi to mark last month’s Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha.

In the latest in a string of fruitless international initiatives, China called on Thursday for a phased, region-by-region ceasefire and the setting up of a transitional governing body – an idea which opposition leaders hope to flesh out at a meeting in Qatar next week.

Veteran opposition leader Riad Seif has proposed a structure bringing together the rebel Free Syrian Army, regional military councils and other rebel forces alongside local civilian bodies and prominent opposition figures.

His plan, called the Syrian National Initiative, calls for four bodies to be established: the Initiative Body, including political groups, local councils, national figures and rebel forces; a Supreme Military Council; a Judicial Committee and a transitional government made up of technocrats.

The initiative has the support of Washington. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called on Wednesday for an overhaul of the opposition, saying it was time to move beyond the troubled Syrian National Council.

The SNC has failed to win recognition as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people and Clinton said it was time to bring in “those on the front lines fighting and dying”.

(Additional reporting by Oliver Holmes in Beirut and Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva; Editing by Jon Boyle)

World News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

Disney-ABC Adds to Sandy “Day of Giving”

NEW YORK (TheWrap.com) – Disney-ABC is expanding on plans to designate Monday a “Day of Giving” that will fill ABC’s schedule from morning until late night with calls to donate to Hurricane Sandy victims.

Disney has announced a $ 2 million donation to hurricane relief, and from “Good Morning America” until “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” on Monday, every ABC show will urge viewers to help.

ABC said Friday that ABC Family, SOAPnet, Radio Disney, “General Hospital,” “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire” and the Disney Stores will all get into the giving spirit.

ABC Family and SOAPnet will show “Day of Giving” PSAs on air, on their websites and through social media. Radio Disney will feature similar messages on the air and on Facebook. “General Hospital” stars have recorded PSAs that will air during the show and throughout network programming, and “Who Wants a Millionaire” will also include messages and PSAs.

The Disney Store and DisneyStore.com, meanwhile, will spread the word with in-store PSAs, social marketing efforts, emails and messages on the DisneyStore.com home page.

“The response to Monday’s ‘Day of Giving’ has been nothing short of amazing, and I’m thrilled that ABC Family, SOAPnet, Radio Disney, ‘General Hospital,’ ‘Who Wants To Be A Millionaire’ and the Disney Stores across the nation have joined the cause,” said Anne Sweeney, co-chair of Disney Media Networks and president of Disney-ABC Television Group. “We are going to do everything possible to encourage our viewers and customers to help those who are dealing with Sandy’s devastation.”

TV News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..

How Computational Models Are Improving Medicine [Video]

Click here to view the video

High-resolution electromechanical model of a heart; courtesy of N. Trayanova

The more we learn about cancer, heart disease and Alzheimer’s, the more vexingly complex they seem–and the more elusive their cures. Even with cutting-edge imaging technology, biomarker tests and genetic data, we are still far from understanding the multifaceted causes and varied developmental stages of these illnesses. With the advent of powerful computing, better modeling programs and a flood of raw biomedical data, researchers have been anticipating a leap forward in their abilities to decipher the intricate dynamics involved human disease. Now, these computational capabilities are starting to arrive, according to a new analysis published online this week in Science Translational Medicine. In fact, “the field has exploded,” Raymond Winslow, director of the Johns Hopkins Institute for Computational Medicine, and co-author of the review, said in a prepared statement. Medicine and medical research largely have been focused on small specialties and narrow studies. But the body is a whole system–not isolated organ groups–and it is in constant interaction with the wider environment, including pollutants, toxins and other stressors. The resulting interactions do not only work in a single direction; instead, we have learned that there are feed-forward and feedback loops and crosstalk on cellular, molecular and genetic levels. This nexus is where advances in computational medicine are poised to make a large contribution. “Computational medicine can help you see how the pieces of the puzzle fit together to give a more holistic picture,” Winslow said. “We may never have all of the missing pieces, but will wind up with a much clearer view of what causes disease and how to treat it.” Models comparing gene expression in different patients have already successfully helped to determine different grades of prostate cancer, predict how different patients will respond to breast cancer treatment and find different types of stomach cancer. Scientists are also taking advantage of more advanced anatomical data to model whole organs and their function–and dysfunction. Using, for example, diffusion tensor magnetic resonance imaging, researchers can collect detailed information about heart anatomy, fiber and structure. This macro structure can be combined with more cellular-based models for “unprecedented structural and biophysical detail, including cardiac electromechanics,” the researchers noted in their paper. With this information, scientists are learning more about blood-flow dynamics, arrhythmia and heart attacks. These new models are now starting to be translated back to individual patients, to help find better treatments. Computational-medicine algorithms from detailed brain maps have already been used to develop an iPad app that is being used clinically to help doctors decide on deep brain stimulation locations and strengths. These models, however, also need to be checked frequently against real-world data and adjusted accordingly. But researchers who are armed to deal with this once unusual cross-discipline endeavor are growing more common. “There is a whole new community of people being trained in mathematics, computer science and engineering, and they are being cross-trained in biology,” Winslow said. “This allows them to bring a whole new perspective to medical diagnosis and treatment.” The myriad applications for computational medicine approaches are only beginning to be explored, the researchers noted. “As we gain confidence in the ability of computational models to predict human biological processes, they will help guide us through the complex landscape of disease, ultimately leading to more effective and reliable methods for disease diagnosis, risk stratification and therapy,” the researchers wrote. “We are poised at an exciting moment in medicine.”

Video of electromechanical heart model courtesy of N. Trayanova

Follow Scientific American on Twitter @SciAm and @SciamBlogs. Visit ScientificAmerican.com for the latest in science, health and technology news.
© 2012 ScientificAmerican.com. All rights reserved.

Health News Headlines – Yahoo! News

Read More..