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Tuesday, November 7, 2006

A new study released by Christchurch researcher from the Christchurch School of Medicine and Health Sciences, David Fergusson, shows that “substantional benefits” come from a circumcision, a baby boy having his foreskin removed.

Mr Fergusson said that the rate of sexually transmitted diseases is halved due to circumcision, even after accounting for the amount of sex partners, unprotected sex and their family background. “Circumcision also reduces the risk of transmitting HIV and the incidence of urinary tract infections.”

The report, which was published in the international scientific journal Pediatrics, took 25-years to complete as it followed 510 males from birth until they were 25-years-old.

“The public health issues raised by these findings clearly involve weighing the longer-term benefits of routine neonatal circumcision in terms of reducing risks of infection within the population, against the perceived costs of the procedure,” Mr Fergusson said.

However the American Academy of Pediatrics has described the current study as “complex and conflicting.” The American Academy of Pediatrics opposes the practice, which is why in the US the circumcision rate has been falling since 1999.

In New Zealand, only between ten and twenty percent of all males are circumcised, which is one of the lowest rates in the world. Circumcision is the normal practice in Samoa and Tonga and also among Jewish and Muslim men.

The Royal Australasian College of Physicians said in 2004, “There is no medical reason for routine circumcision of newborn boys.”

The current study has made some health specialists reconsider their stance on the issue. “People feel passionate on both sides, but I’m going to recommend that we take another careful look at this,” said Jay Berkelhamer, US Academy of Pediatrics president and professor of pediatrics at the University of Florida.

Edgar Schoen, who has reconsidered his stance on the issue, he said: “The academy’s opposition is irresponsible. The benefits of circumcision far outweigh risks, and doctors should be telling parents that.”

“Even if it does bring down sexually transmitted disease, cutting normal tissue of an unconsenting minor is a human rights violation,” said Marilyn Milos, from anti-circumcision group, National Organization of Circumcision Information Resource Centers (NOCIRC).

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

Gerald Levert, R&B singer, songwriter and producer died of a heart attack around 2:30 p.m. on Friday.

Gerald Levert was the son of Eddie Levert (of the soul group The O’Jays). Levert was known for a number of top ten hits in the 1980s and 90s, particularly “Pop, Pop Goes My Mind”, “Casanova”, and ABC-123″. Levert had finished an album, which is expected to go into release in early 2007.

The memorial service for his death will be held Friday, November 17, and scheduled to honor Levert are Stevie Wonder, Johnny Gill and Angie Stone.

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Recent cyber attacks in Estonia that have paralyzed the high tech country’s Web sites are a threat to national security, according to the country’s Minister of Defense. This has concerned NATO, seeing that Estonia is a member state of the organization. The attacks have subsided this week.

The Defense Minister Jaak Aaviksoo also mentioned that Russia may have been behind the attacks. He stated that the IP numbers in the initial attack belong to Russian government offices, but says that it’s insufficient evidence that the government is behind it. The Kremlin is dismissing the accusations, saying that its caused by hackers producing fake Kremlin IP addresses.

The cyber attacks came after Estonia removed a Soviet-era statue of a Bronze Soldier in Tallinn, which angered many Russians. Riots have left 160 injured, and 1 dead.

Both NATO and the European Union views this as an attack on one of their member states. Three hundred Estonian IT specialist worked day and night to fix the problem.

The Estonian government plans to analyze server logs and data to find out who is behind the attacks.

Saturday, July 19, 2008

This year’s Leisure Taiwan trade show (a.k.a Taiwan Sport Recreation and Leisure Show) started yesterday, with 131 companies participating including sports media companies such as ESPN and VideoLand Television, businesses selling sports equipment and fitness clubs.

There were also a variety of sports being played in the arena built for the trade show. The events included a 3-on-3 basketball tournament, free style shooting, and bicycle test-riding. In addition, conferences discussed issues related to sports and physical education.

A major topic in the trade show was energy-efficiency and, as a result, bicycles and similar sports equipment were being heavily promoted.

Next Tuesday, companies from the electronics industry plan to promote their industry at “2008 Digital E-Park.” In previous years, organizations from the electronics industry have showcased their products at Leisure Taiwan instead of at the Digital E-Park, so this move has reduced the number of markets covered by Leisure Taiwan.

Sunday, March 26, 2006

Buffalo, New York —For the second weekend in a row, demonstrators protested the Elmwood Village Hotel proposal on the proposed site.

The Elmwood Village Hotel is a proposed hotel by Savarino Construction Services Corporation and is designed by architect Karl Frizlen of the Frizlen Group. It is to be placed on the corner of Elmwood and Forest Avenues in Buffalo and will require the demolition of at least five properties (1109-1121 Elmwood).

The proposal also required that all five properties, including 605 Forest, be rezoned to a “C-2” zone, or a “special development plan.” The rezoning was passed by Buffalo’s Common Council on March 21, 2006.

Russell Smith, owner of the Six Nation’s Gift Shop at 1121 Elmwood, also participated in the protest.

“I am a Native American and we opened a Native American gift shop and we are just brand new [and just] opened. Having started out a business for the first time, and it the only Native American shop in the city, and I do not see the use of any hotel, especially at this district. The Elmwood Strip is pretty well established. Some of these people have been here a long while you know and they’re [Savarino Construction] disrupting their livelihood,” said Smith to Wikinews.

When Smith was asked if he was going to be in any of the shops in the new hotel he replied, “we don’t have the option of getting into the hotel or any of the shops that are going to be there. We haven’t [had] any idea that they [Savarino] were even planning to tear these buildings down to put a hotel here until we had moved in. I think thats a little unfair.”

Former City of Buffalo Mayor Anthony Masiello was asked to sign the petition to stop the hotel when he walked by, but he declined saying, “I respect what you are doing, but I am for the hotel.”

Despite the cold weather, at least 45 people showed up to walk the picket line.

For the moment, no further protests have been scheduled, pending the final decision on the hotel proposal by the city’s Planning Board which meets Tuesday, March 28, 2006. The meeting begins at 8:00am and will be held in room 902 on the 9th floor of City Hall in downtown Buffalo.

On Saturday morning several individuals attended a meeting with a lawyer to see what could be done, if anything, about the proposal and about Hans Mobius, former Buffalo mayoral candidate and owner of the properties to be demolished at 1109-1121 Elmwood.

One of the attendees, Nancy Pollina, co-owner of Don Apparel with Patty Morris, stated that “there is a case” but that she is likely unable to afford the large attorney’s fees. Pollina reports that she is looking into a “legal fund.”

Some of the affected are considering going to the New York State Supreme Court pro se to seek an injunction.

Some tenants of Mobius’s buildings have accused him of being a “slumlord” and claim that he “intentionally neglected” his properties with the intention of selling. Mobius, who has owned the properties for about 20 years, tried in 1995 to sell them to a developer who wanted to build a Walgreens Drugstore on the same site as the proposed hotel.

Mobius is expected to appear in housing Court on April 11, 2006. He has not returned any phone calls from Wikinews.

Monday, November 15, 2004

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil — Two lawyers of accused drug dealer Luiz Fernando da Costa (also known as Fernando Beira-Mar) were arrested Sunday November 14 in a restaurant located at Rio de Janeiro city in Brazil. They have been accused of bribing Brazilian federal police officers.

Luiz Fernando da Costa, known as Fernando Beira-Mar or Fernandinho Beira-Mar, is one of the biggest drug dealers of Latin America according to police. Beira-Mar was arrested by the Colombian army at April 20-21, 2001, in a FARC camp located at a forest near Colombia and Venezuela and then transferred to Brazil where he is been in prison until now.

According to officers the lawyers had offered R$200,000 (US$71,658.9) to police officers asking them to release Marcos José Monteiro Carneiro, another man accused of being a drug dealer.

Wednesday, February 23, 2005A compound in the common daisy-like plant feverfew kills human leukemia stem cells and could form the basis for newer, more effective drugs for the disease.

American researchers at the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York say that it could take months to develop a useable drug from the compound, parthenolide.

However, they are working to do so with chemists at the University of Kentucky who have identified a water-soluble molecule with the same properties. The US National Cancer Institute has also accepted the work into its rapid access program, which aims to speed experimental drugs into human clinical trials.

“This research is a very important step in setting the stage for future development of a new therapy for leukemia,” says Rochester researcher Craig Jordan. “We have proof that we can kill leukemia stem cells with this type of agent, and that is good news.”

Parthenolide appears to target the roots of myeloid leukemia, stem cells, while current treatments including the relatively new drug Gleevec don’t. So, “You’re pulling the weed without getting to the root,” says Jordan.

Used for centuries to fight fevers, inflammation and arthritis, feverfew earned interest from the Rochester researchers after other scientists showed that it could prevent skin cancer in animal models.

So the researchers investigated how a concentrated form of the plant component parthenolide would affect leukemia cells and normal cells.

Comparing the impact of parthenolide to the common chemotherapy drug cytarabine, they found that parthenolide selectively killed leukemia cells while sparing normal cells better.

While the findings suggest that parthenolide is a good starting point for new drugs, people with leukemia aren’t being encouraged to take high doses of feverfew as they could not take enough of the remedy to halt the disease.

The research is reported in the journal Blood.