A “virtually untreatable” form of tuberculosis is quickly emerging across the globe, according to a federal report Thursday.

The total number of infections by the new strain is relatively small, but researchers fear it will spread rapidly in the TB incubators of Eastern Europe, India and China.

In 2004, the strain accounted for 11 percent of all drug-resistant TB cases in industrialized countries, up from 3 percent in 2000. “The time to act is now to prevent a new pandemic,” said Dr. Marcos Espinal, executive secretary of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Stop TB Partnership.

Source: Seattle Times

–Considering I just the The Constant Gardener, this is pretty scary.

“Using a standard statistical test, there is more than a 50 percent chance that a violent eruption will happen at Vesuvius next year. With each year that goes by, the statistical probability increases,” he said.

Source: Discovery

The Supreme Court announced today that it will hear a challenge to a federal law outlawing a late-term abortion procedure, reopening the contentious issue on Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr.’s first day on the bench.

The law, the Partial Birth Abortion Act, was passed in 2003 but was immediately challenged in court and has never taken effect. It was ruled unconstitutional by three federal appeals courts in the last year, in rulings based on a Supreme Court decision in 2000 striking down a similar law passed in Nebraska.

abortion, alito, supreme court

Source: NYT

“It’s unbelievably tone-deaf politically at this point in our history, four years after 9/11, to entertain the idea of turning port security over to a company based in the UAE, who avows to destroy Israel,” Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, said in a “Fox News Sunday” interview.

DP World would gain control over most operations at ports in New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Miami, Baltimore and New Orleans through the acquisition of Peninsular and Oriental.

Source: Bloomberg

–Gotta be some predictive theories from this?

France appears to be the latest European country affected by the the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus.

A wild duck, which was found dead last week near the central-eastern town of Joyeux, yesterday proved positive for the H5 strain and “bore strong similarities to the H5N1 Asian influenza”, the French agriculture ministry said.

Samples from the dead bird have been sent to the EU’s Reference Laboratory for avian influenza in Weybridge, England for further tests, but officials expect the worst.

The Netherlands has joined France in putting forward plans to vaccinate poultry, with officials considering proposals to inoculate up to six million birds. However, scientists are divided over the effectiveness of vaccination and officials worry that other countries might use inoculation as a pretext to ban European poultry imports.

….The H5N1 virus has already been found in Greece, Slovenia, Italy, Austria, Hungary and Germany. Earlier this week, France extended its ban on keeping poultry outside to the whole of the country. The Government intends to have 14 million human vaccination kits ready by the end of the year.

Source: The New Zealand Herald

–More Bird Flu spreading to India and Iraq. I have added Bird Flu as its own category at this point.

The European Union said avian influenza has been found in two swans in Austria and tests were being conducted to determine if it is the deadly H5N1 strain.

The European Commission, in a statement sent by e-mail today, said Austria was applying “precautionary measures.” Austria becomes the fourth EU nation to be hit by bird flu, after Greece, Italy and Slovenia.

“The Austrian authorities have informed the European Commission this afternoon of a confirmed case of the H5 avian influenza virus in two dead swans found in the region of Stiria, near to the city of Graz,” the commission said. “Further tests will now be carried out.”

A wild swan tested positive for an H5 subtype of avian influenza in Slovenia, the European Commission said yesterday, a day after Italy and Greece confirmed the lethal H5N1 virus in swans. The commission is the EU’s executive branch.

The virus has killed birds in more than 20 countries and infected at least 166 people, killing 88 of them.

Source: Bloomberg

Bird Flu, Avian flu, Italy, Greece, Austria, H5N1

-Side note: I really liked Vienna when I was there.

Iran has started to inject uranium feedstock gas into centrifuges at its Natanz nuclear facility, crossing an internationally agreed “red line” on the path to producing the material for atomic weapons.

A senior diplomat from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) confirmed that researchers at the republic’s pilot enrichment plant in central Iran had taken the crucial step, signalling a major escalation in the long-running face-off between Tehran and the West.

Iran has publicly pledged to resume its suspended nuclear programme before the United Nations’ watchdog meets in Vienna next month to discuss possible UN Security Council action, which could include sanctions.

The diplomat said Iran had not yet fired up the whole 164-centrifuge cascade but had begun to load some centrifuges with the raw uranium hexafluoride (UF6), which can then be purified into enriched uranium.

Source

Iran, EU, United States, Russia, Nuclear, Middle East

Fewer Americans died of cancer in 2003 than in previous years, the first such decline ever recorded, although the number of cancer deaths among women increased, the American Cancer Society said on Thursday.

“From 2002 to 2003, the number of recorded cancer deaths decreased by 778 in men, but increased by 409 in women, resulting in a net decrease of 369 total cancer deaths,” the American Cancer Society said in a statement.

Due largely to a decline in smoking among men, it is the first decrease in numbers since 1930, when nationwide data was first compiled.

The society predicts that 2006 will see a slight decline compared to 2005, projecting that 1.4 million Americans will be diagnosed with cancer in 2006, and 565,000 will die of it.

“The death rate from all cancers combined has decreased in the United States since 1991, but not until 2003 was the decrease large enough to outpace the growth and aging of the population and reduce the actual number of cancer deaths,” the society said.

–A combination of early detection, prevention, and more education are probably the reasons. What does this mean for tobacco companies?

Source: Rueters

Cancer Statistics

Health authorities in China and Indonesia on Friday each reported a woman killed by a deadly strain of bird flu. Azerbaijan became the latest country to report an outbreak among fowl, and Nigeria said the virus had spread there, too.

The spread of bird flu has increased the chance that the virus will mutate and cause disease in humans and a possible pandemic, said Dr. David Nabarro, the U.N. bird flu chief. He said there is no evidence yet of any change in the bird flu virus.

Source: ABC News

Pilot Steve Fossett, who on Friday was more than halfway through his quest to set a record for the longest distance, nonstop flight, had his parachute on and was ready to bail out in case his plane broke apart due to extreme turbulence over India.

Source: Discovery

I predict they will overshoot the Baja peninsula to see how far they can go.