First Lady Sees 'Movement' in Childhood Obesity












As she celebrates the third anniversary of her Let's Move! initiative, first lady Michelle Obama told "Good Morning America" co-anchor Robin Roberts that the country is seeing real "movement" on the issue of childhood obesity.


"We've really changed the conversation in this country. When we started, there were a lot of people in this country who would have never thought that childhood obesity was a health crisis. But now we're starting to see some movement on this issue," the first lady told Roberts. "Our kids are eating better at school. They're moving more. And we're starting…to see a change in the trends. We're starting to see rates of obesity coming down like never before."


"What we're seeing is that there's hope, and when a nation comes together, and everyone is thinking about this issue and trying to figure out what role they can play, then we can see changes," she said.


Mrs. Obama is set to embark on a star studded national tour this week to promote and celebrate her Let's Move! initiative. Her first stop will be in Clinton, Miss. on Wednesday when she appears at an event highlighting healthy school lunches with Rachael Ray.


"I'm going back to Mississippi because when I first went there, Mississippi was considered one of the most unhealthy states in the nation," Mrs. Obama said.








Will Sequestration Turn US Into 'Second-Rate Power' Watch Video









Jay Carney Discusses Biden Self-Defense Tips Watch Video









'Preschool for All': Obama Plan Faces Challenges Watch Video





"If we could fry water in Mississippi, we would, we would do that," Roberts, who grew up in Pass Christian, Mississippi, said. "Food is a culture."


"But the good news in Mississippi is that they've seen a decline in childhood obesity of 13 percent, so we're gonna go celebrate and highlight what has been going on there. There's still work to do," the first lady said.


On Thursday, the first lady will travel to her hometown of Chicago, where she will be joined by Olympic gymnasts and tennis star Serena Williams to promote more physical activity in schools. Later in the day, Mrs. Obama will discuss healthy food choices at a Wal-Mart store in Springfield, Mo.


Mrs. Obama said she will announce a new initiative called the "My Plate Recipe Partnership," which will provide families with online access to healthy recipes that meet the My Plate guidelines, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's replacement of the food pyramid.


"More and more chefs, more and more food companies are understanding that they have to find ways to help families do this in a way that's gonna taste good, that kids are gonna like it," she said.


The first lady, Roberts and Chef Marcus Robert Samuelsson, who owns Red Rooster Harlem in New York City, cooked a healthy meal of beef stir fry and broccolini together on the "Good Morning America" set. Mrs. Obama admitted "it's been a while" since she's cooked for her family, but said she looks forward to the day she can whip up meals for her husband and daughters.


"I walk in the kitchen every day, every day," she joked.


But cooking for her family isn't the only thing Mrs. Obama said she misses since becoming first lady.


"Going to Target for me is like a dream, you know? That one time I went, you noticed it created a stir. I'm gonna do it again, doggone it. Next four years, I'm going out. I'm breaking out. I'm gonna disguise Bo. I'm gonna put on a coat. I'm gonna take a walk, and my agents won't know a thing. Don't tell 'em," she joked.






Read More..

Mobile makers set sights on grandparents






BARCELONA: As smartphone giants Apple and Samsung battle for the wallets of tech-savvy youngsters, a growing number of manufacturers is trying to lure a fast-growing new market: their grandparents.

Handset makers at the world's biggest mobile fair in Barcelona, Spain, showed off a slew of new devices aimed at the hundreds of millions of older people put off by the complexity of the latest iPhones and Android-powered smartphones.

One of the leaders of the segment in Europe, Austrian firm Emporia, launched a new handset, the Emporia Connect, at the February 24-28 Mobile World Congress.

The sleek-looking black and silver flip phone is designed not to be "stigmatising" yet easy enough for older buyers to use, said Emporia's general manager for France, Christophe Yerolymos.

It has a keypad with larger numbers and an emergency button that will send an SOS along with data pinpointing the location of the phone.

The phone features a system called Emporia Me, with an array of remote control features for the owner's family, allowing a child or grandchild to check the device's location, battery status, or ensure the volume is up.

While it is not a smartphone and has no mapping service, it does have an orientation feature that lets a user push a single button to get turn-by-turn audible instructions for returning to a car while on a shopping trip, for example.

"Emporia is a company in growth, strong growth, even in the heart of the economic crisis we're in at the moment in Europe," said Yerolymos.

Japan's Fujitsu rolled out a European version of a smart phone for seniors, the Stylistic S01, which first launched in mid-2012 in Japan where it lured buyers from a wider age range than the group anticipated, from 45 years upwards.

It is an Android-based smartphone with large, simplified icons, and a "family alert" button that will send a message along with geo-localisation data.

But it also has an unusual touch-screen that will only respond when the user presses a bit harder so as to avoid launching applications by mistake, said Fujitsu Europe-Middle East-Africa product marketing director James Maynard.

"You can actually pre-touch and then when you know which button you want to press, you can exert a little bit more pressure," he said.

"It's made to grow with you so as you become more confident you naturally will exert more pressure on to the device. It's a stepping stone from a feature phone to a smartphone and using a touch panel for the first time."

Kapsys, a French firm, showed off its SmartConnect handset aimed at seniors.

The firm is in discussions with operators including Orange and is hoping to launch the device for about 400 euros (US$520) in Europe in June and then in the United States by the end of 2013, said chief executive Aram Hekimian.

The SmartConnect boasts familiar features for the market: large icons, text in large characters, remote access for family members and also an SOS button with geo-localisation.

But it also incorporates a digital magnifier, enabling the user to roll the phone over text to facilitate reading, for example. The phone is rich in voice command functions, too, allowing the user to avoid fiddly buttons.

"Seniors today are used to having access to technology. As they get older they will want access to the same functions, the same technologies," Hekimian said.

Kapsys estimated the potential market for the telephone at 600 million people, he said. "Our goal is to capture one percent of that market by 2015."

-AFP/fl



Read More..

Islamic scholars condemn killing of Shia Muslims in Pakistan

MUMBAI: A group of Islamic scholars today called upon international bodies like United Nations, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International and governments across the world to devise ways to put an end to killing of Shia Muslims in Pakistan.

"It is extremely shameful," Islamic scholar Maulana Sayed Ahmedalo Abidi, Imam-e-Juma Khoja Jama Masjid Dongri and Principal of Houza Ilmiya Najifi House, told reporters here.

"Shias are being attacked, shot and bombed. This is extremely serious," he said, urging the Indian government to take up the issue in international forums.

He also appealed to the government of Pakistan to ensure that Shias were protected from violence unleashed by militants.

The Islamic scholars said the Army must be made directly responsible and accountable for the law and order situation and safety of all people, including Shias in Quetta and other parts of Balochistan.

"The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan must look into the issue," said Maulana Zaheer Abbas Rizvi, General Secretary All India Shia Muslim Personal Law Board.

Pakistan has been besieged by militant attacks in recent years, many of them carried out by Pakistani Taliban, who have been waging a bloody insurgency against the government.

Radical Sunni militant groups have also increasingly targeted the country's Shias because they do not view them as real Muslims, Rizvi said in a statement.

Many of these sectarian attacks have occurred in southwest Balochistan province, which has the largest concentration of Shias in Pakistan, he said.

The Islamic scholars also condemned the twin blasts at Hyderabad recently.

Read More..

Koop, who transformed surgeon general post, dies


With his striking beard and starched uniform, former Surgeon General Dr. C. Everett Koop became one of the most recognizable figures of the Reagan era — and one of the most unexpectedly enduring.


His nomination in 1981 met a wall of opposition from women's groups and liberal politicians, who complained President Ronald Reagan selected Koop, a pediatric surgeon and evangelical Christian from Philadelphia, only because of his conservative views, especially his staunch opposition to abortion.


Soon, though, he was a hero to AIDS activists, who chanted "Koop, Koop" at his appearances but booed other officials. And when he left his post in 1989, he left behind a landscape where AIDS was a top research and educational priority, smoking was considered a public health hazard, and access to abortion remained largely intact.


Koop, who turned his once-obscure post into a bully pulpit for seven years during the Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations and who surprised both ends of the political spectrum by setting aside his conservative personal views on issues such as homosexuality and abortion to keep his focus sharply medical, died Monday at his home in Hanover, N.H. He was 96.


An assistant at Koop's Dartmouth College institute, Susan Wills, confirmed his death but didn't disclose its cause.


Dr. Richard Carmona, who served as surgeon general a decade ago under President George W. Bush, said Koop was a mentor to him and preached the importance of staying true to the science even if it made politicians uncomfortable.


"He set the bar high for all who followed in his footsteps," Carmona said.


Although the surgeon general has no real authority to set government policy, Koop described himself as "the health conscience of the country" and said modestly just before leaving his post that "my only influence was through moral suasion."


A former pipe smoker, Koop carried out a crusade to end smoking in the United States; his goal had been to do so by 2000. He said cigarettes were as addictive as heroin and cocaine. And he shocked his conservative supporters when he endorsed condoms and sex education to stop the spread of AIDS.


Chris Collins, a vice president of amFAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research, said many people don't realize what an important role Koop played in the beginning of the AIDS epidemic.


"At the time, he really changed the national conversation, and he showed real courage in pursuing the duties of his job," Collins said.


Even after leaving office, Koop continued to promote public health causes, from preventing childhood accidents to better training for doctors.


"I will use the written word, the spoken word and whatever I can in the electronic media to deliver health messages to this country as long as people will listen," he promised.


In 1996, he rapped Republican presidential hopeful Bob Dole for suggesting that tobacco was not invariably addictive, saying Dole's comments "either exposed his abysmal lack of knowledge of nicotine addiction or his blind support of the tobacco industry."


Although Koop eventually won wide respect with his blend of old-fashioned values, pragmatism and empathy, his nomination met staunch opposition.


Foes noted that Koop traveled the country in 1979 and 1980 giving speeches that predicted a progression "from liberalized abortion to infanticide to passive euthanasia to active euthanasia, indeed to the very beginnings of the political climate that led to Auschwitz, Dachau and Belsen."


But Koop, a devout Presbyterian, was confirmed after he told a Senate panel he would not use the surgeon general's post to promote his religious ideology. He kept his word.


In 1986, he issued a frank report on AIDS, urging the use of condoms for "safe sex" and advocating sex education as early as third grade.


He also maneuvered around uncooperative Reagan administration officials in 1988 to send an educational AIDS pamphlet to more than 100 million U.S. households, the largest public health mailing ever.


Koop personally opposed homosexuality and believed sex should be saved for marriage. But he insisted that Americans, especially young people, must not die because they were deprived of explicit information about how HIV was transmitted.


Koop further angered conservatives by refusing to issue a report requested by the Reagan White House, saying he could not find enough scientific evidence to determine whether abortion has harmful psychological effects on women.


Koop maintained his personal opposition to abortion, however. After he left office, he told medical students it violated their Hippocratic oath. In 2009, he wrote to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, urging that health care legislation include a provision to ensure doctors and medical students would not be forced to perform abortions. The letter briefly set off a security scare because it was hand delivered.


Koop served as chairman of the National Safe Kids Campaign and as an adviser to President Bill Clinton's health care reform plan.


At a congressional hearing in 2007, Koop spoke about political pressure on the surgeon general post. He said Reagan was pressed to fire him every day, but Reagan would not interfere.


Koop, worried that medicine had lost old-fashioned caring and personal relationships between doctors and patients, opened his institute at Dartmouth to teach medical students basic values and ethics. He also was a part-owner of a short-lived venture, drkoop.com, to provide consumer health care information via the Internet.


Koop was born in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, the only son of a Manhattan banker and the nephew of a doctor. He said by age 5 he knew he wanted to be a surgeon and at age 13 he practiced his skills on neighborhood cats.


He attended Dartmouth, where he received the nickname Chick, short for "chicken Koop." It stuck for life.


Koop received his medical degree at Cornell Medical College, choosing pediatric surgery because so few surgeons practiced it.


In 1938, he married Elizabeth Flanagan, the daughter of a Connecticut doctor. They had four children, one of whom died in a mountain climbing accident when he was 20.


Koop was appointed surgeon-in-chief at Children's Hospital in Philadelphia and served as a professor at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.


He pioneered surgery on newborns and successfully separated three sets of conjoined twins. He won national acclaim by reconstructing the chest of a baby born with the heart outside the body.


Although raised as a Baptist, he was drawn to a Presbyterian church near the hospital, where he developed an abiding faith. He began praying at the bedside of his young patients — ignoring the snickers of some of his colleagues.


Koop's wife died in 2007, and he married Cora Hogue in 2010.


He was by far the best-known surgeon general and for decades afterward was still a recognized personality.


"I was walking down the street with him one time" about five years ago, recalled Dr. George Wohlreich, director of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, a medical society with which Koop had longstanding ties. "People were yelling out, 'There goes Dr. Koop!' You'd have thought he was a rock star."


___


Ring reported from Montpelier, Vt. Cass reported from Washington. AP Medical Writers Lauran Neergaard in Washington and Mike Stobbe in New York contributed to this report.


Read More..

Best Moments From the Academy Awards






Host Seth MacFarlane took the stage at the 2013 Oscars with an opening monologue revealing he was ready to poke fun at the star-studded audience.


"The quest to make Tommy Lee Jones laugh begins now," he said.


But it wasn't too long before MacFarlane was interrupted. William Shatner, dressed as his iconic character Captain Kirk from "Star Trek," descended on the stage to warn MacFarlane that he was about to ruin the Oscars and be branded the worst host ever.


"The show is a disaster. I've come back in time … to stop you from ruining the Academy Awards," Shatner said.

Seth MacFarlane's Boobs Tribute


Shatner tried to steer MacFarlane away from singing an "incredibly offensive song that upsets a lot of women in the audience."


Cue MacFarlane's medley "We Saw Your Boobs," a laundry list set to music of acclaimed actresses in Hollywood who all bared their breasts in film.


MacFarlane was joined by the Gay Men's Chorus of Los Angeles to call out Meryl Streep, Anne Hathaway, Naomi Watts, Jodie Foster, Hilary Swank and countless others who we've seen nude in film.



Not every joke funnyman Seth MacFarlane made landed with the A-list crowd at the 85th annual Academy Awards.


The host elicited gasps from the crowd when he introduced "Django Unchained" as "the story of a man fighting to get back his woman, who's been subjected to unthinkable violence. Or, as Chris Brown and Rihanna call it, a date movie."


Another joke that somehow earned a too-soon nod? A throw to President Abraham Lincoln's assassination.


"I'd argue that the actor who really got inside Lincoln's head was John Wilkes Booth," MacFarlane said.


MacFarlane's jab at Mel Gibson didn't land too smoothly either. MacFarlane said the N-word laden "Django Unchained" screenplay was "loosely based on Mel Gibson's voicemails."

Oscars' Movie Musical Tribute


The theme of the 85 annual Academy Awards was celebrating music in film, and the tributes to movie musicals didn't disappoint.


Featured performers included Catherine Zeta-Jones belting "All That Jazz" from 2002's Best Picture winner "Chicago," Jennifer Hudson's show-stopping "And I'm Telling You I'm Not Going" from 2006's "Dreamgirls," and the cast of this year's Best Picture nominee "Les Miserables" reuniting on stage for "One Day More."

Introducing the Von Trapp Family


To introduce Christopher Plummer to the stage to present the award for Best Supporting Actress, MacFarlane couldn't help but make a joke out of the actor's infamous role as Captain Von Trapp in "The Sound of Music."


MacFarlane came out to announce the Von Trapp family singers, but no one came out. Instead, a man dressed in a Nazi uniform ran in to tell him that they were gone.

Kristen Stewart Hobbles on Stage to Present


When Daniel Radcliffe took the stage to present the award for Achievement in Production Design, he was joined by his hobbling co-presenter Kristen Stewart, who was seen crutching along the red carpet during the pre-show.


The "Twilight" star's makeup artist told People magazine that the actress "cut the ball of her foot, quite severely, on glass two days ago."


The Associated Press reported that backstage, Best Supporting Actress winner Anne Hathaway told Stewart to "break a leg."

Jennifer Lawrence's Unstable Victory


Jennifer Lawrence was so shocked to take home the Oscar for Best Actress that she lost her footing on her way up to the stage to accept her award.


"You guys are just standing up because I fell and that's really embarrassing," she said to the audience.


Lawrence regained her composure to give her acceptance speech, extending a special thank you to "the women this year," who she called "so magnificent and so inspiring."

Daniel Day-Lewis a Three-Peat Best Actor Winner


It was a highly anticipated win for Daniel Day-Lewis, who took home the award for Best Actor for his portrayal of Abe Lincoln in Steven Spielberg's "Lincoln."


Lewis cracked a joke in his acceptance speech, saying he was supposed to be cast as Margaret Thatcher and presenter Meryl Streep was the first choice for Lincoln.


"Meryl Streep was Steven's first choice to play Lincoln… I'd like to see that version," Lewis said.

Michelle Obama Announces Best Picture Winner


In one of the biggest surprises of the night, the Academy brought out First Lady Michelle Obama to help Jack Nicholson introduce the nominees for Best Picture.


Rocking her new bangs and a silver gown, the first lady, live from the White House, announced "Argo" as this year's Best Picture.


"It was a thrill to announce the #Oscars2013 best picture winner from the @WhiteHouse! Congratulations Argo!" FLOTUS tweeted afterwards.

Ben Affleck Triumphs at Oscars


Ben Affleck was flabbergasted by his win for Best Picture for "Argo." His frenzied, heartfelt acceptance speech resonated as he thanked his wife, Jennifer Garner, and ended on an inspirational high note.


"I want to thank my wife, who I don't normally associate with Iran. I want to thank you for working on our marriage. It is work, but it is the best kind of work," he said.


"I was here 15 years ago or something and you know I had no idea what I was doing. I stood out here in front of you all, really just a kid. I went out and I never thought I'd be back here and I am because of so many of you who are here tonight …. I want to thank them for what they taught me, which is that you have to work harder than you think you possibly can, you can't hold grudges. It's hard, but you can't hold grudges. And it doesn't matter how you get knocked down in life because that's going to happen. All that matters is that you got to get up."


Read More..

Syria opposition threat clouds first Kerry overseas tour






LONDON: New US Secretary of State John Kerry met British Prime Minister David Cameron on Monday at the start of a get-acquainted tour of Europe and the Middle East, but the Syrian conflict threatened to taint the trip.

US officials were trying to persuade the Syrian opposition to reconsider its threat to boycott an international meeting in Rome on Thursday, which was to be the centrepiece of Kerry's first overseas tour since he took over from Hillary Clinton.

The Syrian National Council has said it will pull out of the 11-nation Friends of Syria talks in protest at the international community's inability to halt the bloodshed.

Kerry is due to meet his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Berlin on Tuesday and is expected to push Moscow to put pressure on the Syrian regime to allow a "political transition".

Lavrov held talks in Moscow on Monday with President Bashar al-Assad's foreign minister, who said the Syrian regime was ready for talks with the rebels and anyone who favours dialogue, in the first such offer by a top Syrian official.

Russia is one of the few major powers who still maintain ties with Assad's regime.

A senior US official said on Sunday: "We feel that Russia can play a key role in convincing the (Syrian) regime that there is need for political transition."

Kerry, a former US presidential candidate, made a gentle start to his marathon tour of close US allies by enjoying a traditional English breakfast with Cameron at Downing Street on Monday.

The two men discussed Syria and also talked of how to achieve a trade deal between the United States and the European Union.

They agreed that the G8 summit in Northern Ireland in June "will be an important moment to inject further momentum into this", according to a statement from Cameron's office.

Kerry then went into talks with British Foreign Secretary William Hague which will be followed by a joint news conference later before Kerry heads to the German capital.

The trip will also include stops in France, Italy, Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.

Kerry is also expected to address issues including Iran, Mali and North Korea during the two-week tour.

US officials were privately optimistic that they could persuade the Syrian opposition to attend the talks on Thursday.

Publicly, a State Department official said: "We are stressing... that they (the opposition) have an opportunity in Rome, to see the countries that have been their greatest supporters and to present to all of us how they see the situation on the ground in security, humanitarian, political and economic terms.

"This meeting is also an opportunity for them to meet our new secretary of state and to speak directly to him," he added.

Syria will also dominate Kerry's talks in Ankara and Cairo, where he is due to meet with the Secretary General of the Arab League, Nabil al-Arabi.

The Kerry-Lavrov meeting on Tuesday will take place at the same time as talks in Kazakhstan between the so-called 5+1 world powers -- US, China, Russia, France, Britain and Germany -- and Iran over the issue of Tehran's nuclear policy.

A US official said strengthened sanctions were having a "real effect" in Iran and welcomed the "common" position among the group.

The trip sees Kerry, the son of a diplomat, back on familiar ground. He spent part of his childhood in Berlin and has family in France.

-AFP/fl



Read More..

Ishrat case: Police officers' custody extended till Feb 28

AHMEDABAD: A local court today extended the custody of two police officers, Tarun Barot and Bharat Patel, arrested on Saturday by CBI in connection with alleged fake encounter of Ishrat Jahan, for three more days.

Additional chief judicial magistrate H S Khutwad said "The accused police officers have been remanded to police custody till February 28 for further interrogation."

The agency had earlier argued that the duo, during their one-day police custody granted by the court yesterday, were adopting evasive tactics and not cooperating during interrogation.

"The encounter case is an old one and the accused police officers are adopting various tactics to hide crucial evidence during interrogation," CBI lawyer Abhishek Arora said.

The CBI argued that "the accused police officers, knowing fully well that the police custody granted to them was only for 24 hours, did not at all cooperate during interrogation and gave evasive replies."

Opposing the remand application, counsel Brijrajsinh Jhala, who argued for Patel, said that despite being given 24 hours for interrogation, they were probed only for one and a half hours.

He also said that "false evidence is being created in the name of interrogation", adding that CBI has mentioned that some Call Detail Record (CDR) of police officials involved in nakabandi and encounter was available while earlier the agency had said that CDR was permanently lost.

CBI counsel, however, pointed out that in the initial FIR filed by the Crime Branch, it was mentioned that CDR was permanently lost but the FIR filed by CBI stated that for commercial purposes (billing), telecom companies could make CDR available for seven years.

The CBI had arrested Special Operation Group (SOG), Gandhinagar police inspector Bharat Patel and suspended Mehsana Dy SP Tarun Barot late on Saturday evening.

Patel was police sub-inspector with Crime Branch, Ahmedabad in 2004.

The Gujarat police had alleged that 19-year-old Mumbai girl Ishrat Jahan, Javed Shaikh alias Pranesh Pillai, Amjadali Akbarali Rana and Zeeshan Johar were a part of the conspiracy to assassinate Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi. They were killed in an encounter on June 15, 2004 on a stretch of road between Ahmedabad and Gandhinagar.

Earlier, CBI had arrested Girish Singhal, Superintendent of Police with State Crime Records Bureau, and J G Parmar, retired DSP and the court, after rejecting their remand, had sent them in judicial custody.

After Ishrat's mother complained about the alleged fake encounter, Gujarat High Court constituted a Special Investigation Team (SIT), which concluded that the encounter was fake. The high court handed over the case to CBI on December 1, 2011, and monitoring the investigations.

Read More..

FDA approves new targeted breast cancer drug


WASHINGTON (AP) — The Food and Drug Administration has approved a first-of-a-kind breast cancer medication that targets tumor cells while sparing healthy ones.


The drug Kadcyla from Roche combines the established drug Herceptin with a powerful chemotherapy drug and a third chemical linking the medicines together. The chemical keeps the cocktail intact until it binds to a cancer cell, delivering a potent dose of anti-tumor poison.


Cancer researchers say the drug is an important step forward because it delivers more medication while reducing the unpleasant side effects of chemotherapy.


"This antibody goes seeking out the tumor cells, gets internalized and then explodes them from within. So it's very kind and gentle on the patients — there's no hair loss, no nausea, no vomiting," said Dr. Melody Cobleigh of Rush University Medical Center. "It's a revolutionary way of treating cancer."


Cobleigh helped conduct the key studies of the drug at the Chicago facility.


The FDA approved the new treatment for about 20 percent of breast cancer patients with a form of the disease that is typically more aggressive and less responsive to hormone therapy. These patients have tumors that overproduce a protein known as HER-2. Breast cancer is the second most deadly form of cancer in U.S. women, and is expected to kill more than 39,000 Americans this year, according to the National Cancer Institute.


The approval will help Roche's Genentech unit build on the blockbuster success of Herceptin, which has long dominated the breast cancer marketplace. The drug had sales of roughly $6 billion last year.


Genentech said Friday that Kadcyla will cost $9,800 per month, compared to $4,500 per month for regular Herceptin. The company estimates a full course of Kadcyla, about nine months of medicine, will cost $94,000.


FDA scientists said they approved the drug based on company studies showing Kadcyla delayed the progression of breast cancer by several months. Researchers reported last year that patients treated with the drug lived 9.6 months before death or the spread of their disease, compared with a little more than six months for patients treated with two other standard drugs, Tykerb and Xeloda.


Overall, patients taking Kadcyla lived about 2.6 years, compared with 2 years for patients taking the other drugs.


FDA specifically approved the drug for patients with advanced breast cancer who have already been treated with Herceptin and taxane, a widely used chemotherapy drug. Doctors are not required to follow FDA prescribing guidelines, and cancer researchers say the drug could have great potential in patients with earlier forms of breast cancer


Kadcyla will carry a boxed warning, the most severe type, alerting doctors and patients that the drug can cause liver toxicity, heart problems and potentially death. The drug can also cause severe birth defects and should not be used by pregnant women.


Kadcyla was developed by South San Francisco-based Genentech using drug-binding technology licensed from Waltham, Mass.-based ImmunoGen. The company developed the chemical that keeps the drug cocktail together and is scheduled to receive a $10.5 million payment from Genentech on the FDA decision. The company will also receive additional royalties on the drug's sales.


Shares of ImmunoGen Inc. rose 2 cents to $14.32 in afternoon trading. The stock has ttraded in a 52-wek range of $10.85 to $18.10.


Read More..

Crash at Daytona Exposes Risks to Fans












The risks of racing extend beyond the drivers.



Fans can wind up in the danger zone, too.



A horrifying crash on the last lap of a race at Daytona International Speedway injured at least 30 fans Saturday and provided another stark reminder of what can happen when a car going nearly 200 mph is suddenly launched toward the spectator areas.



The victims were sprayed with large chunks of debris — including a tire — after rookie Kyle Larson's machine careened into the fencing that is designed to protect the massive grandstands lining NASCAR's most famous track.



"I love the sport," said Shannan Devine, who witnessed the carnage from her 19th-row seat, about 250 feet away. "But no one wants to get hurt over it."



The fencing served its primary purpose, catapulting what was left of Larson's car back onto the track. But it didn't keep potentially lethal shards from flying into the stands.



"There was absolute shock," Devine said. "People were saying, 'I can't believe it, I can't believe it. I've never seen this happen, I've never seen this happen. Did the car through the fence?' It was just shock and awe. Grown men were reaching out and grabbing someone, saying, 'Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh!' It was just disbelief, absolute disbelief."



From Daytona to Le Mans to a rural road in Ireland, auto racing spectators have long been too close to the action when parts start flying. The crash in the second-tier Nationwide race follows a long list of accidents that have left fans dead or injured.





The most tragic incident occurred during the 1955 24 Hours of Le Mans, when two cars collided near the main stands. The wreck sent debris hurtling into the crowd, while one of the cars flipped upside down and exploded in a giant fireball.



Eighty-three spectators and driver Pierre Levegh were killed, and 120 fans were injured.



The Daytona crash began as the field approached the checkered flag and leader Regan Smith attempted to block Brad Keselowski. That triggered a chain reaction, and rookie Kyle Larson hit the cars in front of him and went airborne into the fence.



The entire front end was sheared off Larson's car, and his burning engine wedged through a gaping hole in the fence. Chunks of debris from the car were thrown into the stands, including a tire that cleared the top of the fence and landed midway up the spectator section closest to the track.



"I thought the car went through the fence," Devine said. "I didn't know if there was a car on top of people. I didn't know what to think. I'm an emotional person. I immediately started to cry. It was very scary, absolutely scary. I love the speed of the sport. But it's so dangerous."



The fencing used to protect seating areas and prevent cars from hurtling out of tracks has long been part of the debate over how to improve safety.



Three-time Indianapolis 500 winner Dario Franchitti lost close friend Dan Wheldon at Las Vegas in the 2011 IndyCar season finale, when Wheldon's car catapulted into the fencing and his head struck a support post. Since his death, IndyCar drivers have called for studies on how to improve the safety barriers.



Franchitti renewed the pleas on Twitter after the Daytona crash, writing "it's time (at)Indycar (at)nascar other sanctioning bodies & promoters work on an alternative to catch fencing. There has to be a better solution."



Another fan who witnessed the crash said he's long worried that sizable gaps in the fencing increase the chances of debris getting through to the stands.





Read More..

Frustrated Italians vote in crucial election for euro zone


ROME (Reuters) - Italians voted on Sunday in one of the most closely watched and unpredictable elections in years, with pent-up fury over a discredited elite adding to concern it may not produce a government strong enough to lead Italy out of an economic slump.


The election, which concludes on Monday afternoon, is being followed closely by investors; their memories are still fresh of the potentially catastrophic debt crisis that saw Mario Monti, an economics professor and former bureaucrat, summoned to serve as prime minister in place of Silvio Berlusconi 15 months ago.


A weak Italian government could, many fear, prompt a new dip in confidence in the European Union's single currency.


Opinion polls give the center-left a narrow lead but the result has been thrown completely open by the prospect of a huge protest vote against the painful austerity measures imposed by Monti's government and deep anger over a never-ending series of corruption scandals. Berlusconi's centre-right has also revived.


"I'm not confident that the government that emerges from the election will be able to solve any of our problems," said Attilio Bianchetti, a 55-year-old builder in Milan, who voted for the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement of comic and blogger Beppe Grillo.


The 64-year-old Grillo, heavily backed by a frustrated generation of young Italians hit by record unemployment, has been one of the biggest features of the last stage of the campaign, packing rallies in town squares up and down Italy.


"He's the only real new element in a political landscape where we've been seeing the same faces for too long," said Vincenzo Cannizzaro, 48, in the Sicialian capital Palermo.


Italians started voting at 8 a.m. (0700 GMT). Polling booths will remain open until 10 p.m. on Sunday and open again between 7 a.m. and 3 p.m. on Monday. Exit polls will come out soon after voting ends and official results are expected by early Tuesday.


Snow in northern regions is expected to last into Monday and could discourage some of the 47 million people eligible to vote in Italy to head out to polling stations, though the Interior Ministry has said it is fully prepared for bad weather.


Monti and his wife cast their votes at a polling booth in a Milan school on Sunday morning and centre-left leader Pier Luigi Bersani, the leader opinion polls suggest will have to form a new government, voted in his home town of Piacenza.


A small group of women's rights demonstrators greeted former prime minister Berlusconi when he voted in Milan. They bared their breasts in protest at the conservative leader, who is on trial at present for having sex with an underage prostitute.


Whichever government emerges from the election will have to tackle reforms needed to address problems that have given Italy one of the most sluggish economies in the developed world for the past two decades.


But the widespread despair over the state of the country, where a series of corruption scandals has highlighted the stark divide between a privileged political elite and millions of ordinary Italians, has left deep scars.


"It's our fault, Italian citizens. It's our closed mentality. We're just not Europeans," said Luciana Li Mandri, a 37-year-old public servant in Palermo.


"We're all about getting favors when we study, getting a protected job when we work. That's the way we are and we can only be represented by people like that as well," she said.


FRUSTRATION


Final polls published two weeks ago showed center-left leader Bersani with a 5-point lead, but analysts disagree about whether he will be able to form a stable majority that can make the economic reforms they believe Italy needs.


While the center left is still expected to gain control of the lower house, thanks to rules that guarantee a strong majority to whichever party wins the most votes nationally, a much closer battle will be fought for the Senate, which any government also needs to control to be able to pass laws.


The euro zone's third-largest economy is stuck in deep recession, struggling under a public debt burden second only to Greece in the 17-member currency bloc and with a public weary of more than a year of austerity policies.


Bersani is now thought to be just a few points ahead of media magnate Berlusconi, the four-times prime minister who has promised tax refunds and staged a media blitz in an attempt to win back voters.


Think-tank consultant Mario, 60, who was on his way to vote in Bologna, said Bersani's Democratic Party was the only serious grouping that could help solve the country's economic woes.


"They're not perfect," he said. "But they've got the organization and the union backing that will help them push through the structural reforms."


A strong fightback by Berlusconi, who has promised to repay a widely hated housing tax, the IMU, imposed by Monti last year, saw his support climb during a campaign that relentlessly attacked the "German-centric" austerity policies of the former European Union commissioner.


"I won't vote for Monti, and I don't think a lot of people will. He made a huge blunder with IMU," said 35-year-old hairdresser Marco Morando, preparing to vote in Milan.


But the populist frustration Berlusconi's campaign tapped into has also benefitted Grillo and many pollsters said his 5-Star Movement, made up of political novices, was challenging the center-right for the position as second political force.


"I'm very worried. There seems to be no way out from a political point of view, or from being able to govern," said Calogero Giallanza, a 45-year-old musician in Rome, who voted for Bersani's Democrats.


"There's bound to be a mess in the Senate because, as far as I can see, the 5-Star Movement is unstoppable."


(Additional reporting by Cristiano Corvino, Lisa Jucca, Jennifer Clark, Matthias Baehr and Sara Rossi in Milan, Stephen Jewkes in Bologna, Wladimir Pantaleone in Palermo, Stefano Bernabei and Massimiliano Di Giorgio in Rome; Editing by Robin Pomeroy and Alastair Macdonald)



Read More..