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| Fewer communities risk running out of water in California drought Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 06:16 PM PDT  A moderate dose of winter rainfall hasn't ended California's historic drought, but it has dropped just enough moisture on the beleaguered state to help 14 communities that had risked running out of water. In January, public health officials in the most populous U.S. state said that 17 communities were at risk of running out of water in 60 to 90 days. But now just three small communities were at risk, one in the central part of the state and two in the north, Department of Public Health spokeswoman Anita Gore said on Thursday. In the town of Willits, for example, a grant from the state helped to pay for a backup water treatment plant constructed within weeks of the drought's declaration by Governor Jerry Brown in January. Full Story | Top |
| California school bus crash injures driver, 11 children Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 06:09 PM PDT Eleven middle school students and a bus driver were injured on Thursday, three critically, when their bus veered off a Southern California road, authorities said. The bus driver and two of the students from El Rancho Charter School in Anaheim, California, were listed in critical condition at a local hospital, said Bob Dunn of the Anaheim Police Department. Full Story | Top |
| Oregon's broken healthcare exchange may move to federal network Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 05:41 PM PDT By Shelby Sebens PORTLAND (Reuters) - Top officials for Oregon's troubled health insurance network, dogged by technical glitches that have kept a single subscriber from enrolling online, recommended on Thursday dumping the state website in favor of a federally run healthcare exchange. Oregon, a state that fully embraced the Affordable Care Act, has endured one of the rockiest rollouts of President Barack Obama's signature healthcare law, requiring tens of thousands of applicants to apply on paper since launching on October 1. Managers of the state exchange, called Cover Oregon, have determined it would cost about $78 million to fix and continue under the beleaguered system, well above the projected cost of switching over to the federal exchange, spokesman Alex Pettit said. Under the latest proposal, the private insurance plans now offered through Cover Oregon would be moved to the federal website, while individuals seeking coverage under an expansion of Medicaid, a state-federal healthcare plan for the needy, would apply through the Oregon Health Authority, spokeswoman Ariane Holm said. Full Story | Top |
| Exclusive: Allergan approached Shire about takeover but rebuffed -sources Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 05:18 PM PDT By Olivia Oran, Soyoung Kim and Nadia Damouni NEW YORK (Reuters) - Allergan Inc approached Shire Plc in recent months about a possible takeover but was rebuffed, according to people familiar with the matter, in the latest example of a U.S. drugmaker seeking to buy an overseas rival to lower its tax rate. The preliminary approach for Shire, which is based in Ireland and has a market value of $33 billion, did not progress to serious discussions between the two companies, the sources said. Since then Allergan has received an unsolicited $47 billion takeover offer from Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc teamed up with activist investor Bill Ackman's Pershing Square Capital Management. Analysts have suggested one way for the Botox maker to defend against the unsolicited bid would be to acquire foreign drugmakers such as Shire, Jazz Pharmaceuticals Plc or Alkermes Plc. One of the sources said it was unclear if Allergan would try to revive talks with Shire, or pursue another target as a means to remain independent. Full Story | Top |
| Motor racing-For Mosley, safety is Senna's lasting legacy Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 05:01 PM PDT By Alan Baldwin LONDON, April 25 (Reuters) - It has been 20 years since Formula One last suffered a driver fatality but that milestone, an achievement that would once have stretched credulity, will get less attention than the anniversary of Ayrton Senna's death at Imola. The sport - already praying for Michael Schumacher's recovery from a skiing accident that left the seven-times world champion in a coma - is only too aware of the dangers still lurking around every corner even if it is enjoying the safest period it has ever known. But one always has this feeling don't tempt fate," Max Mosley, former president of the governing International Automobile Federation (FIA), told Reuters. Mosley, who raced in the 1968 Formula Two race that claimed the life of the great Jim Clark and was FIA president at the time of Senna's death at Imola on May 1, 1994, is nonetheless proud of what has been achieved since then. Full Story | Top |
| EU should halve meat, dairy consumption to cut nitrogen-report Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 04:10 PM PDT By Nina Chestney LONDON (Reuters) - People in the European Union, who according to a United Nations body eat way more protein than necessary, could prompt big cuts in nitrogen pollution if they halved their meat and dairy consumption, a U.N.-backed report said on Friday. Nitrogen is used in fertilizer to replace nutrients which are removed by soils during plant growth but excess nitrogen can harm the environment by polluting water, air and soil. That represents around 80 percent of nitrogen emissions from all sources, said the study by the United Nations' Economic Commission for Europe's (UNECE) Task Force on Reactive Nitrogen. "If all people within the EU would halve their meat and dairy consumption, this would reduce greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture by 25 to 40 percent, and nitrogen emissions by 40 percent," lead author Henk Westhoek, program manager for Agriculture and Food at the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, said in a statement. Full Story | Top |
| Netflix makes deals to appear on first U.S. cable boxes Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 04:03 PM PDT  LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Netflix Inc's streaming video service will be integrated into TiVo Inc set-top boxes provided by Atlantic Broadband, Grande Communications and RCN, the cable providers said on Thursday. The deals are the first in the United States to bring Netflix as an app to cable set-top boxes. Netflix has similar arrangements with operators in Europe. (Reporting by Lisa Richwine; Editing by Steve Orlofsky) Full Story | Top |
| 'Vapers' relieved FDA won't restrict popular e-cigarette flavors Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 03:28 PM PDT  Mcshalonic Martinez, 25, puffed on a caramel mochachino flavored e-cigarette at the Henley Vaporium in lower Manhattan, saying the device helped him kick his three-pack-a-day smoking habit. He can't imagine going back to traditional cigarettes. It does not recommend restricting flavored products or online sales and advertising, which public health advocates say make the products more attractive for children and teens. The announcement comes on the heels of a New York City law passed last year that banned e-cigarette usage anywhere that traditional cigarettes are prohibited. Full Story | Top |
| Caregivers Are Key In Protecting Kids' Dental Health Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 03:24 PM PDT By Kathryn Doyle NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Many kids on Medicaid are not receiving dental care, and those who do often first show up with a dental emergency, according to a new study. Less than half of a group of four-year-olds the researchers followed had ever visited a dentist, and caregivers who neglected their own oral health tended to neglect that of their children too. "We know that both good oral health and dental problems tend to cluster and co-occur in families," said Kimon Divaris, who led the study at the UNC School of Dentistry at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Full Story | Top |
| Utah sperm swap 'unacceptable' but still unexplained -university docs Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 03:23 PM PDT A University of Utah committee investigating reports that a Salt Lake City fertility clinic worker artificially inseminated a patient with his own sperm called the action "unacceptable" on Thursday, but said it could not determine whether the switch was intentional. Practices at two now-closed Salt Lake-area clinics came into question last year when Pamela Branum, who was artificially inseminated at Reproductive Medical Technologies Inc, claimed genetic testing revealed that, instead of her husband, a lab technician had fathered their daughter in the early 1990s. The technician, Tom Lippert, has since died. He was also a registered sperm donor at the clinics and frequently supplied samples. Full Story | Top |
| Behavior therapy works over short term for young kids with OCD Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 02:27 PM PDT By Andrew M. Seaman NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - A family-based cognitive behavioral therapy markedly improves symptoms in children as young as five years old with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), according to a new study. The behavioral treatment, which involved parents heavily and is already known to work for older kids and teens, left almost three quarters of the young children significantly better off, according to objective measurements. "I really think that the results highlight this family-based cognitive behavior therapy model as the first-line treatment for children with OCD," Jennifer Freeman, the study's lead author, told Reuters Health. People with OCD have a set of compulsions - feeling compelled to do something - that cause them distress or disrupt their daily lives. Full Story | Top |
| In fight with opiate overdoses, N.J. county issues antidote to police Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 02:24 PM PDT Police in coastal Ocean County in New Jersey, faced with a doubling in deaths from drug overdoses in the past year, have issued all police officers an anti-opiate drug in a pilot program aimed at combating deaths tied to painkiller addiction. Police have already saved six people from overdoses since launching early this month a test of the anti-opiate drug naloxone, which helps restore breathing in people who have overdosed on opiate drugs. "We're on a roll," said Al Della Fave, a spokesman for the county prosecutor's office, which led the effort. In almost every case, their first comment is how great it will be to do something except stand there." The county, home to about 583,000 people, saw 112 overdose deaths in 2013, more than double the 53 recorded in 2012, Della Fave said. Full Story | Top |
| Vaccines prevent more than 700,000 child deaths in the U.S.: CDC Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 02:16 PM PDT By David Beasley ATLANTA (Reuters) - A federal government program launched 20 years ago to increase vaccinations for low-income children in the United States will prevent more than 700,000 deaths, but measles remains a stubborn adversary, with more than 129 cases so far this year, a federal agency said on Thursday. There have been no deaths from the disease reported in the United States this year, the CDC said. The importation of measles from overseas makes vaccination even more important for children in the United States, the CDC said. "Borders can't stop diseases anymore, but vaccinations can," CDC Director Tom Frieden told reporters. Full Story | Top |
| FDA approves test to detect DNA of cancer-causing HPV strains Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 02:07 PM PDT (Reuters) - The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday approved the use of a test for cancer-causing strains of the human papillomavirus (HPV), clearing the way for replacement of the Pap smears used to screen most women for cervical cancer. The FDA said the cobas HPV Test, made by Switzerland's Roche Holding AG, can be used for women age 25 and older to help assess the need for additional diagnostic testing. The test had previously been approved in conjunction with, or as a follow up to, a Pap test, which examines cervical cells for changes that might become cervical cancer. Experts have said it will be tough to convince doctors to move from the current testing guidelines, which call for the use of both Pap tests and HPV tests, since there have been no studies directly comparing the regimens. Full Story | Top |
| Alstom shares jump on report of $13 billion GE bid Thursday, Apr 24, 2014 02:04 PM PDT  By Natalie Huet and Benjamin Mallet PARIS (Reuters) - Shares of Alstom jumped 10.9 percent on Thursday after a report that U.S. conglomerate General Electric was in talks to buy the struggling French turbine and train maker for about $13 billion. The companies may announce the deal as early as next week, Bloomberg cited people with knowledge of the matter as saying late on Wednesday. If confirmed, a takeover offer from a foreign company would raise concern among politicians and unions in France, where Alstom employs around 18,000 people, or 20 percent of its global workforce. While Alstom is well known for both its transport and power turbine business, the latter is likely to be of most interest to GE, one person familiar with the industry said. Full Story | Top |
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