Scientists reveal flu develops in the roof of the mouth as study shows how it spreads Bless you: The virus spreads through sneezing and coughs, scientists found
Researchers have found that flu develops in the roof of the mouth - and that it is spread through coughs and sneezes.
The key area of where flu develops is located in the soft palate separating the back of the mouth and the nasal cavity, according to new research.
Scientists have found that the inflammation associated with infection in the soft palate stimulates the sneezing and coughing, with it propelling the flu virus out of the mouth enabling it to spread easily.
Discovery: Scientists found that flu develops at the roof of the mouth
Dr Kanta Subbarao, of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) in the US said: "Historically, the soft palate has not been examined in animal models of influenza."
Published in the science journal Nature, the research was carried out on ferrets whose mouths are similar to humans.
Breeding ground: Researchers made the discovery after experimenting with ferrets They found evidence that a patch of mucous-coated soft tissue is a key site for the emergence of flu viruses. Scientists continued their research by making mutations of the flu strain responsible for the 2009 influenza pandemic, a strain notoriously good at spreading from person to person. They then used the engineered virus to infect a group of ferrets, which are widely used as a model of human influenza infection to analyse how it spread.
Most Agree With Trump on America's Lost Greatness, Bloomberg Poll Finds
A national survey finds that 72 percent of Americans say their country isn't as great as it once was —a central theme of front-runner Donald Trump's campaign.
Donald Trump, wearing his “Make America Great Again” hat, is escorted by security after a rally aboard the Battleship USS Iowa in San Pedro, California, on Sept. 15, 2015.
Photographer: Patrick T. Fallon/Bloomberg
Americans are “fed up” with politics, suspect the wealthy are getting an unfair edge, and think the country is going in the wrong direction, according to a new Bloomberg Politics poll that lays bare the depth and breadth of the discontents propelling outsider candidates in the Republican presidential field. The survey shows that 72 percent of Americans think their country isn't as great as it once was—a central theme of front-runner Donald Trump's campaign. More than a third prefer a presidential candidate without experience in public office. Three of the four candidates leading the Republican field fit that description: Trump, the first choice of 21 percent of registered Republicans and voters who say they lean that way, followed by neurosurgeon Ben Carson with 16 percent, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush with 13 percent, and former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina with 11 percent. Fiorina and Carson have seen the strongest gains among Republicans since the survey was taken a month ago. In the interim, voters have had their first extended looks at the candidates in two nationally televised debates. Fiorina's numbers, at 1 percent in the August poll, leaped by 10 percentage points while Carson jumped 11 percentage points, up from 5 percent. Trump's numbers have remained unchanged. Together, the three candidates who have never held political office account for 48 percent of the Republican vote.
“At some level, it is a risk to elect a person with no experience in government,” said J. Ann Selzer, president of West Des Moines-based Selzer & Co., which conducted the poll. “Republicans, especially, seem ready to take that risk.” After nominating politicians with solid government resumes again and again, Selzer said, the electorate seems interested in going another direction. “They see a nation falling behind or outright failing,” she said. “Whether it is an act of courage or an act of despair, more than a third are opting to take the risk of backing a genuine outsider.” Thirty-seven percent of Americans say they're more drawn to a presidential candidate who is a government outsider but who has also been a leader, handled complex issues, and managed teams to get things done. Among Republicans and those who lean that way, the preference for outsider candidates is even more pronounced: 51 percent, compared to 24 percent among Democrats.
Florida Senator Marco Rubio, the youngest candidate in the field and an impassioned speaker, has made an impression on voters. His 60 percent favorability rating was second only to Carson's 68 percent. Fiorina, a relative novice to the national stage, matched Bush, the son and brother of presidents, at 57 percent.
Carly Fiorina, former chairman and chief executive officer of Hewlett-Packard Co., is enjoying a bounce after her latest poll performance.
Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg
“She's very articulate, has great control, is intelligent,” said Paula Gartside, a 50-year-old paralegal and substitute teacher in Pennsylvania who is supporting Fiorina after being impressed by her last debate performance. “I don't think she pulls any punches. What you see is what you get.” The two candidates with the highest unfavorable ratings are Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, at 42 percent, and Trump, at 40 percent. Still, those who like Trump are strongly supportive. “He's an outsider,” said Darleen Starcher, 61, a North Carolina resident who likes Trump. “He's not wanting or caring about being politically correct. He wants to make us better again. He wants to make us No. 1 again.” The primary campaign is playing out before an electorate that's in a sour mood, with 66 percent of Americans saying the nation is headed in the wrong direction. That's the highest level recorded in a Bloomberg national poll since December 2013, when the economy was in worse shape than it is today. Given a series of choices about the greatness of America, 47 percent picked “falling behind,” while 25 percent said “failing.” Asked to name the biggest threats to American greatness, more cited “moral decay” (32 percent) and “our own lagging work ethic” (27 percent) than the rise of the Islamic State (26 percent) and competition with China (21 percent). A quarter of those responding also cited a “concentration of the nation's wealth among a very few individuals.” Economically, the poll shows the nation's mood is bittersweet. On overall financial security, 27 percent of Americans say things are getting better, compared to 15 percent who say their situation is getting worse. The same pattern holds for job security (20 percent better, 13 percent worse) and market value of home (29 percent better, 14 percent worse). On performance of investments, 21 percent of Americans say their situation is getting worse, compared to 18 percent who say better. For all four economic indicators, the percentage of people saying they expect their situation to get better is lower than it was five months ago when Bloomberg asked similar questions. And while a majority of 54 percent say they're moving closer, not further away, from their hopes for their career and/or finances, there are other indications of simmering economic discontents: a much larger majority—70 percent—say they see the gap between rich and everyone else as getting bigger. And 73 percent say that the tax code should be reformed so the wealthy pay proportionately more than middle-class people, a theme that's been picked up by candidates running the ideological gamut from Trump to Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders in the Democratic race. Nearly three-quarters of Americans say they're fed up with politics and think it amounts to “people playing games,” while 59 percent say the political system is broken and the nation needs to “just start over.” Yet if citizens are disgusted, they are not cynical about democracy. Only 30 percent think their vote doesn't matter and most believe that the political process is important. Just 19 percent agree with the statement “I'm not affected by politics—it doesn't matter which party is in power.” Asked for their review of the 2016 campaign so far, 53 percent rated it “entertaining.” The poll of 1,001 U.S. adults, including 391 registered Republicans and Republican-leaning voters, was conducted from Sept. 18-21. The margin of error on the full sample is plus/minus 3.1 percentage points
In this episode "Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition" trainers and life coaches Chris and Heidi Powell educate host Judy Greer on the importance of staying hydrated. A huge plus for hydration, Judy says, is that it helps prevent wrinkles. But another unflattering side effect of dehydration is weight gain, Chris and Heidi caution. Even mild dehydration can slow down your metabolism by as much as 3%. Ninety percent of Americans are chronically dehydrated, and the body often misinterprets thirst for hunger. The effects are far from skin-deep: Lack of water is the #1 trigger for daytime fatigue and headaches. What's the best temperature for your water? It depends, Chris says. If you want to hydrate yourself quickly drink it cold. But if you want to fill up and suppress your appetite, choose warm because it stays in your system longer and expands the stomach, sending a signal to your brain that you're "full." Watch for more of Chris and Heidi's tips on hydration, including how to use your body weight to determine how much you should drink daily.
Experts warn of danger that the new viral strains created by mixing bird-flu virus with human influenza could escape from the laboratory to cause a global pandemic killing millions of people.
Senior scientists have criticised the “appalling irresponsibility” of researchers in China who have deliberately created new strains of influenza virus in a veterinary laboratory.
They warned there is a danger that the new viral strains created by mixing bird-flu virus with human influenza could escape from the laboratory to cause a global pandemic killing millions of people. Lord May of Oxford, a former government chief scientist and past president of the Royal Society, denounced the study published today in the journal Science as doing nothing to further the understanding and prevention of flu pandemics. “They claim they are doing this to help develop vaccines and such like. In fact the real reason is that they are driven by blind ambition with no common sense whatsoever,” Lord May told The Independent. “The record of containment in labs like this is not reassuring. They are taking it upon themselves to create human-to-human transmission of very dangerous viruses. It’s appallingly irresponsible,” he said. The controversial study into viral mixing was carried out by a team led by Professor Hualan Chen, director of China’s National Avian Influenza Reference Laboratory at Harbin Veterinary Research Institute. Professor Chen and her colleagues deliberately mixed the H5N1 bird-flu virus, which is highly lethal but not easily transmitted between people, with a 2009 strain of H1N1 flu virus, which is very infectious to humans. When flu viruses come together by infecting the same cell they can swap genetic material and produce “hybrids” through the re-assortment of genes. The researchers were trying to emulate what happens in nature when animals such as pigs are co-infected with two different strains of virus, Professor Chen said. “The studies demonstrated that H5N1 viruses have the potential to acquire mammalian transmissibility by re-assortment with the human influenza viruses,” Professor Chen said in an email. “This tells us that high attention should be paid to monitor the emergence of such mammalian-transmissible virus in nature to prevent a possible pandemic caused by H5N1 virus,” she said. “It is difficult to say how easy this will happen, but since the H5N1 and 2009/H1N1 viruses are widely existing in nature, they may have a chance to re-assort,” she added. The study, which was carried out in a laboratory with the second highest security level to prevent accidental escape, resulted in 127 different viral hybrids between H5N1 and H1N1, five of which were able to pass by airborne transmission between laboratory guinea pigs. Professor Simon Wain-Hobson, an eminent virologist at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, said it is very likely that some or all of these hybrids could pass easily between humans and possess some or all of the highly lethal characteristics of H5N1 bird-flu. “Nobody can extrapolate to humans except to conclude that the five viruses would probably transmit reasonable well between humans,” Professor Wain-Hobson said. “We don’t know the pathogenicity [lethality] in man and hopefully we will never know. But if the case fatality rate was between 0.1 and 20 per cent, and a pandemic affected 500 million people, you could estimate anything between 500,000 and 100 million deaths,” he said. “It’s a fabulous piece of virology by the Chinese group and it’s very impressive, but they haven’t been thinking clearly about what they are doing. It’s very worrying,” Professor Wain-Hobson said. “The virological basis of this work is not strong. It is of no use for vaccine development and the benefit in terms of surveillance for new flu viruses is oversold,” he added. An increasing number of scientists outside the influenza field have expressed concern over attempts to deliberately increase the human transmissibility of the H5N1 bird-flu virus. This is done by mutating the virus so that it can pass by airborne droplets between laboratory ferrets, the standard “animal model” of human influenza. Two previous studies, by Ron Fouchier of Erasmus Medical Centre in Rotterdam and Yoshihiro Kawaoka of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, caused uproar in 2011 when it emerged that they had created airborne versions of H5N1 that could be passed between ferrets. The criticism led to researchers to impose a voluntary moratorium on their H5N1 research, banning transmission studies using ferrets. However they decided to lift the ban earlier this year, arguing that they have now consulted widely with health organisations and the public over safety concerns. However, other scientists have criticised the decision to lift the moratorium.
Aaron Swartz files reveal how FBI tracked internet activist A blogger has published once-classified FBI files that show how the agency tracked and collected information on internet activist Aaron Swartz. Swartz, who killed himself in January aged 26, had previously requested his files and posted them on his blog, but some new documents and redactions are included in the files published by Firedoglake blogger Daniel Wright. Wright was given 21 of 23 declassified documents, thanks to a rule that declassifies FBI files on the deceased. Wright said that he was told the other two pages of documents were not provided because of freedom of information subsections concerning privacy, "sources and methods," and that can "put someone's life in danger." The FBI's files concern Swartz's involvement in accessing the Public Access to Court Electronic Records (Pacer) documents. In pursuit of their investigation, the FBI had collected his personal information and was surveilling an Illinois address where he had his IP address registered. One page reads: "Washington Field Office requests that the North RA attempt to locate Aaron Swartz, his vehicles, drivers license information and picture, and others. Since Swartz is the potential subject of an ongoing investigation, it is requested that Swartz not be approached by agents." The FBI also collected information from his social networking profiles, including Facebook and Linkedin. The latter proved to be a catalog of his many notable accomplishments, which include being a co-founder of Reddit, a founder of a website to improve the government, watchdog.net and as metadata adviser at Creative Commons. Information from a New York Times article about his Pacer hack was also included in the files, though strangely, since the article can still be read online, the name of the article's other subject, Carl Malamud, was blocked out. Hacking collective Anonymous released a State Department database Monday in memory of Swartz. The files included employees' personal information such as addresses, phone number and emails.
One year after public uproar forced them to pause, researchers
who study H5N1 avian influenza by designing new, extra-virulent strains are set
to resume their work.
In a letter published Jan. 23 in the journals Nature
and Science, 40 virologists, including leaders of the most high-profile
experiments, declared that their voluntary moratorium is now over.
Though the virologists might be ready, other experts say
concerns about the experiments — overhyped benefits, a lack of independent
review, dangers of accidental release — have not been addressed, raising the
chances that the first pandemic H5N1 strain will come from a laboratory.
“There has been no substantive progress in the past year,” said
microbiologist Richard Ebright of Rutgers University. “An independent and
transparent determination needed to be made that risks were outweighed by
benefits, and that appropriate biosafety precautions were in place.”
No such determination was made. Ebright called the decision to
lift the moratorium “dangerously irresponsible.”
In their letter, the virologists asserted that the year-long
moratorium gave public health experts and the public a chance to discuss the
H5N1 research and its conduct. Now it’s time to continue, they say.
“Transmission research benefits public health,” said Yoshihiro
Kawaoka of the University of Wisconsin at a press conference announcing the
moratorium’s end. “The greater risk is not doing research that could help us be
better equipped for a pandemic.”
It was research led by Kawaoka and Ron Fouchier of Erasmus
University in the Netherlands that originally sparked the controversy late in
2011, when it was reported that they’d engineered H5N1 strains capable of
passing airborne between ferrets, a common animal model for flu infections in
humans.
For now, naturally-occurring H5N1 strains, though highly
lethal to humans, don’t pass easily between us. Infection requires prolonged
physical contact rather than a passing cough. If H5N1 should go pandemic,
scientists say that millions of people could die.
News that experiments had enhanced H5N1 transmissibility was
largely greeted with horror by the public and many scientists, who feared that
an experimental strain might accidentally be released, or even inform the design
of H5N1 by bioterrorists.
Fouchier, Kawaoka and their colleagues argued that fears were
overblown and surpassed by possible benefits: influenza surveillance that
catches infectious strains early, better drugs, better vaccines. Faced with the
outcry, though, they agreed in January 2012 to temporarily halt the research so
that fears could be allayed.
“We declared a pause to this important research to provide
time to explain the public-health benefits of this work, to describe the
measures in place to minimize possible risks, and to enable organizations and
governments around the world to review their policies,” they wrote in the Jan.
23 letter. “Because the risk exists in nature that an H5N1 virus capable of
transmission in mammals may emerge, the benefits of this work outweigh the
risks.”
Other scientists don’t necessarily agree with that estimation
of risk and benefits. Some argue that lab-engineered strains may not reflect the
course of evolution in the wild, potentially confusing the search for dangerous
strains.
'We’re at the same place we were a year
ago, and that’s definitely not a place where it’s appropriate to resume this
work.'
Even if the engineered H5N1 insights do hold, alternate approaches
might arguably have produced the same information, but with far less potential
risk.
According to Roger Brent, a molecular biologist at the Fred
Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, and David Relman, president of the Infectious
Disease Society of America, virologists could study transmissibility using
so-called attenuated H5N1 strains, which have had their virulence genetically
reduced.
“It’s perfectly possible to study how a virus will become more
transmissible without doing so in a virus that is also lethal to its hosts,”
said Brent. “Biologists who study pathogens frequently study attenuated strains
in order to reduce the risks.”
Whether this approach is a safer, equally useful alternative
is something that has not been independently evaluated. “One year on, an
irreproachable, independent risk–benefit analysis of such research, perhaps
convened by a body such as the World Health Organization, is still lacking,”
wrote the editors of Nature in an editorial accompanying the
moratorium’s lift.
Though multiple meetings were held in the United Statesand
internationally during the moratorium, many observers say they were driven less
by a spirit of open discussion than a desire to promote the research.
“The benefits of the work are mainly advanced by assertions.
To some extent, the substance to give them a fair evaluation has been lacking,”
said Brent. “The sessions have been designed to reinforce the conclusion of the
community of researchers who wish to pursue this work.”
“There still has not been a robust discussion between funders,
scientists, policy-makers, and the rest of the public,” said Relman. “An
insufficient breadth of the scientific community has been involved.”
Similar charges were made last year after a federal review
committee urged that Kawaoka and Fouchier’s results not be published in full so
as to prevent the risk of misuse, only to reverse their decision after pressure
from the virologists.
At the time,
committee member Michael Osterholm, an influenza epidemiologist at the
University of Minnesota, charged that ostensibly objective meetings were “designed to produce the outcome that occurred.”
According to Fouchier, his own H5N1 research will resume in
the next several months, as could other research programs outside the United
States. Within the United States, where federal guidelines for have yet to be
finalized, it will take longer for research to resume.
One outstanding
issue is how engineered H5N1 strains will be classified under the federal Select Agent program,
which determines whether research on certain pathogens demands extra oversight
and should be limited to just a handful of labs.
The National Institutes of Health, the largest funder of the
engineered H5N1 experiments, is also considering whether to establish a review
committee to determine when proposed experiments are too risky to conduct. For
now, however, that’s just a hypothetical.
“A proposal has been announced, but the proposal hasn’t been
finalized or approved,” said Ebright. “It’s a step forward, but it’s unclear if
it will move beyond the proposal stage, and if so, when that will happen.”
Ebright believes the moratorium’s lift sets the stage for
research to resume soon in the United States, where virologists will chafe at
restrictions.
“Substantively we’re at the same place we were a year ago,”
said Ebright, “and that’s definitely not a place where it’s appropriate to
resume this work.”
In an interview with the Washington Post, NIH chief
Anthony Fauci said he expects the U.S. guidelines to be finalized within weeks.
Had those guidelines existed when the H5N1 engineering
experiments were first suggested, Fauci told the Post, “Our answer
simply would have been, yes, we vetted it very carefully and the benefit is
worth any risk. Period, case closed.”
Said Relman, “The efforts made so far to establish an
oversight process and risk assessment have not achieved the desired goals.”
If and i repeat IF what VP Biden said is true and he is not having a Biden moment, like he is prone to do, and the President really is planning to do this then he should be impeached
Biden: Obama Might Use Executive Order to Deal With Guns
Vice President Joe Biden revealed that President Barack Obama might use an executive order to deal with guns. "The president is going to act," said Biden, giving some comments to the press before a meeting with victims of gun violence. "There are executives orders, there's executive action that can be taken. We haven't decided what that is yet. But we're compiling it all with the help of the attorney general and the rest of the cabinet members as well as legislative action that we believe is required." Biden said that this is a moral issue and that "it's critically important that we act." Biden talked also about taking responsible action. "As the president said, if you're actions result in only saving one life, they're worth taking. But I'm convinced we can affect the well-being of millions of americans and take thousands of people out of harm's way if we act responsibly." Biden, as he himself noted, helped write the Brady bill. Eric Holder was scheduled to be at the meeting that's currently take place at the White House.
Maybe this one should get as much press as Sandy Hook, but it wont, because it is not what they want. Im not really for Police in schools, but it seems to work.
Gunman killed at Sullivan Central
On Monday morning, Thomas Richard Cowan loaded 13 bullets into two handguns, left his German shepherd chained to the fence and drove eight miles from his home in Kingsport to Sullivan Central High School. Whatever his mission, it was the 62-year-old Vietnam veteran’s final drive. For about an hour, Cowan’s armed invasion spread panic throughout the school before a burst of officers’ gunfire brought him down. No others were injured. No one knows why Cowan pointed his Honda in the direction of the Blountville, Tenn., high school, where his brother is a janitor. He is described – in court records and interviews – as a peculiar man with a history of erratic, sometimes criminal, behavior and a deep suspicion of the government. He parked his car Monday morning in a handicapped space just in front of the school’s main entrance. Second period was just getting under way at 9:10 a.m. when Ashley Thacker, a junior, arrived at the main entrance of her high school. Thacker, 16, had been at a doctor’s appointment and was on her way to a music theory class as she approached the locked doors. She noticed a man standing in the 10-foot waiting area between the two sets of doors, waiting to be buzzed in. His bald crown was framed with brown hair. He had a mustache, she remembered, and he was holding a cane. He told her to go on ahead of him. But she never made it through the doors. Instead, Melanie Riden, principal of Sullivan Central, came striding through the locked doors. “He pulled out his gun and started pointing it at people,” Thacker said. Cowan trained a .380-caliber semi-automatic pistol at Riden’s face, said Sullivan County Sheriff Wayne Anderson. Carolyn Gudger, the school resource officer, drew her gun, then shielded the principal’s body with her own. ... The Sullivan County Sheriff's Department confirms that a man confronted the student resource officer at the school today. The SRO calmed the man down until more officers arrived, at which time the man drew his gun on the SRO and he was shot by officers with the Sullivan County Sheriff's Department. We will have more information on the condition of the injured man as soon as it becomes available.
Hospital Opens Emergency Tent in Midst of Increasing Flu Cases
It’s the most miserable time of the year for many people in the area. Flu season is in full effect and this one in particular is shaping up to be more extreme than usual.
The State Department of Health reports that four Pennsylvanians have already died of complications from the influenza virus.
In response to the early start of flu season, the Lehigh Valley Hospital-Cedar Crest had to open an emergency space to care for the increased number of people with flu-like symptoms.
The hospital tells NBC10's Katy Zachry why the tent was erected.
"If we can remove them from the main ED and put them in environment where everyone is masked and everyone can be protected, it's safer for them and certainly safer for the staff," said Terry Burger, hospital director of infection control.
The mobile surge tent is set up outside the emergency department.
Officials say a similar measure was taken during the H1N1 flu a few years ago.
Here is the last i can find on David Gregory, it appears (hopefully) that his special treat might be coming to an end.
David Gregory case referred for possible prosecution
The Washington, D.C. police department has completed its investigation of David Gregory and has presented his case to the District’s Office of the Attorney General for “a determination of the prosecutorial merit of the case.” Gregory, it will be recalled, was in possession of a high-capacity ammunition magazine which he displayed on television. In Washington, D.C., possessing a magazine capable of holding 10 or more rounds of ammunition, even if empty, is a misdemeanor punishable by up to one year in jail and a $1,000 fine. I don’t know much about D.C. criminal procedure, but I assume the police found reason to believe that Gregory violated the law; otherwise I doubt it would have “presented” his case. Now it is up to the D.C. Attorney General, Irving Nathan, to determine whether to prosecute. This decision, I imagine, will entail a review of the evidence presented and, perhaps, some exercise of prosecutorial discretion. I tend to agree with NRA President David Keene, who told CNN he did not think Gregory should be prosecuted because the portion of the law he violated is silly. However, the D.C. police reportedly told NBC in advance that it would violate the law to show the magazine. If so, and assuming the police offered no conflicting opinion, the ensuing violation seems willful and flagrant, making it difficult not prosecute, I should think.
While the radical left plots gun control and confiscation, normal Democrats join the run on guns
Written By: Bob - Jan• 08•13
As radical progressives in Washington, D.C. and the bluest of the blue states plot gun control and confiscation in direct violation of Supreme Court decisions, U.S and state laws, and the plain meaning of state and federal constitutions, it is easy to feel isolated as a liberty-loving American. There are signs, though, that despite the illusion of Democratic unity being provided by the mainstream media, that many rank-and-file Democrats would abandon these radical few on the issue of guns. In fact, many already have.
The results show that Democrats have been the fastest growing purchasers of firearms, closing the gap to 40%-55% by household ownership compared to Republicans. The New York Times article cited above implies that Democrat ownership by household is no more than 31% and falling; meaning that there is a widening gap with Republicans. Nate Silver writes, “The 2008 poll makes clear that gun ownership is deeply embedded in political identity, and vice versa.” This appears to be the opposite of the case. More than statistical nitpicking, these gun control issues are high stakes politics. They ultimately determine the relationship of the citizenry and its government. If people are meant to be passive subjects, accepting whatever politicians and bureaucrats dictate to them, then severely restricting and even confiscating their weapons makes perfect sense. On the other hand, if people intend to retain any sense of autonomy or even a shred of representative government, they must insist that their right to self-defense is inviolable.
You don’t see every gun shop in the nation emptied in two weeks because a handful of bitter-clingers decided to go on a buying spree. It is a significant quantity of Americans in both parties that are voting with their wallets and (in states that require them) their purchase permits. The thousands of new readers this site has picked up over the past two weeks don’t belong to one party, one race, or one religion. The only thing many of us have in common is a deep and abiding love for our liberties, and sincere determination to protect them at any cost for our children’s sake. We can hope that the volume and depth of our feeling, echoed far and wide, will chill the drive towards tyranny that seems to have overwhelmed the senses of our would-be masters.
Absolutely exceptional article at Lucky Gunner about steel vs brass case, over 10000 rounds and alot more i would highly recommend you reading it. Great job.
HARRISBURG, Pa., Sept. 6 (UPI) -- Several patients in Pennsylvania and Indiana are recovering from a unique type of swine flu, health officials say.
Influenza A viruses occur in many animals, including humans, swine (pigs) and wild birds. The virus in question is akin to previous H3N2 human infections, but also contains a genetic piece of the 2009 H1N1 virus, health officials in Pennsylvania said in a statement.
The first case occurred in Indiana and three more turned up in Pennsylvania. The three patients in Pennsylvania all reported attending the Washington County Fair Aug. 13-20. There appears to be no link between the Indiana and Pennsylvania cases, the health officials said.
Currently, it does not appear the new virus is spreading from person to person but health officials were investigating the cases to learn more about it.
"One patient has recovered and the other two are recovering. Our investigation will continue to focus on the seriousness of the virus," the health officials said.
"Currently, we don't have any evidence to support that this novel influenza A virus will lead to a pandemic, as we haven't yet been able to prove that it is being transmitted from human to human. As with any new influenza A virus, public health officials are working to learn more about the source of this particular strain and to determine how/if it can be spread from person to person."
These Pennsylvania cases were similar to that of seasonal flu, and included fever, lethargy, lack of appetite and coughing. Other influenza symptoms may also include a runny nose, sore throat, eye irritation, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea, and anyone with flu symptoms should seek treatment from a physician, health officials said.
Time for a different vacation? What to get the man that has everything for his birthday
Drive a bulldozer and shoot a machine gun for $525 in Vegas
What to do with all those empty construction sites in Las Vegas, where work on a handful of hotels and other projects has halted in the last few years due to the see-saw economy?
A company called Dig This has a solution, according to the Associated Press. Give tourists one of the most original outings ever: letting them get behind the wheel of heavy machinery including bulldozers and excavators so they can play construction worker. Moving sand and rock not far from the Trump International Hotel and Palace Station casino isn't for penny-slot players; it starts at $210 for an hour and a half on one machine and climbs up to $750 for hours of play on a bulldozer and an excavator.
And it's not just the male species fascinated by playing Bob the Builder. "Fifty percent of our clients are women," Dig This owner Ed Mumm tells me. "They're very good because they listen and they don't put as much pressure" on the machinery.
The AP article quotes Mary Fitzsimons, an emergency room doctor from Walnut Creek, Calif., who took the quick intro course and spent two hours digging a trench, stacking tires and picking up basketballs and placing them on the top of cones. "I thought it would be much clunkier, and the lighter you are with the controls, the easier it worked," she told the AP.
Mumm said he started Dig This after renting an excavator while building a house. "I thought to myself: 'If I'm having this much fun, imagine the amount of people that don't get to do this stuff that would love to do this,' " he said, according to the AP. Dig This is billed as "America's first and only heavy equipment playground."
One of the more unusual offerings is a "Dig and Destroy" package ($525). Participants work the heavy machinery, then are taken to a nearby shooting range to run through what's billed as "50 rounds of ammo-KRISS Super V (fully automatic Sub-Machine Gun); 10 rounds of ammo- Saiga 12 (short barrel Semi-Automatic shot gun); 20 rounds of ammo-M60 (fully automatic machine gun). Less expensive scoop-and-shoot packages are available.
Is it too rich for many visitors' blood?
"There are a lot of high net worth individuals here," Mumm says. "And so many people blow money at nightclubs ... and at the tables" without anything to show for it, he says. Dig This also employs construction workers, for whom times are hard in Vegas, as trainers.
There are many "grapefruits" (Jerry Doyle ref.) in the news today, here is a few it think are not, but as always you all are the ones that have to judge.
U.N. agency warns of possible bird flu resurgence
ROME (Reuters) - The United Nations warned of a possible major resurgence of bird flu and said a mutant strain of the H5N1 virus was spreading in Asia and elsewhere.
The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) on Monday urged increased surveillance and preparation for a potential outbreak of the virus, which it says has infected 565 people since it first appeared in 2003, killing 331 of them.
The virus was eliminated from most of the 63 countries infected at its peak in 2006 after mass poultry culling, but since 2008 it has been expanding geographically in both poultry and wild birds, partly due to migration patterns, the FAO said.
"The general departure from the progressive decline observed in 2004-2008 could mean that there will be a flare-up of H5N1 this fall and winter," the FAO's chief veterinary officer, Juan Lubroth, said in a statement.
He said the appearance of a variant strain of the virus in China and Vietnam was a concern, because it appeared to be able to sidestep the defenses of existing vaccines.
The circulation of the virus in Vietnam also poses a direct threat to Cambodia, Thailand and Malaysia as well as endangering the Korean peninsula and Japan, FAO said.
The latest human death occurred earlier this month in Cambodia, which has registered eight cases of human infection this year, all of them fatal, the agency added.
Countries that could face the biggest problems are Bangladesh, China, Egypt, Indonesia and Vietnam, where the FAO said the virus is still firmly entrenched.
It said recently affected areas included Israel, the Palestinian Territories, Bulgaria, Romania, Nepal and Mongolia.
"Wild birds may introduce the virus, but people's actions in poultry production and marketing spread it," said Lubroth.
"Preparedness and surveillance remain essential ... no one can let their guard down with H5N1," he added.
Does this surprise anyone, and you really believe there will be a democracy there? They will take over there and we have financed it (again).
Iran 'discreetly aided Libyan rebels'
TEHRAN — Iran "discreetly" provided humanitarian aid to Libyan rebels before the fall of Tripoli, Jam-e-Jam newspaper quoted Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi on Sunday as saying.
"We were in touch with many of the rebel groups in Libya before the fall of (Moamer) Kadhafi, and discreetly dispatched three or four food and medical consignments to Benghazi," Salehi told the daily.
"The head of the National Transitional Council (NTC), Mustafa Abdel Jalil, sent a letter of thanks to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for having been on their side and helping," he added.
Since the Libyan uprising erupted in mid-February, Iran has adopted a dual approach -- criticising the Kadhafi regime for its violent assaults on the rebels while at the same time condemning NATO's military intervention.
On Tuesday, Iran "congratulated the Muslim people of Libya" after rebels overran the capital Tripoli, but it has so far distanced itself from officially recognising the NTC.
Pair Arrested For ‘Lack Of Common Sense’ After Rafting Down Main Street In Manayunk
Row, row, row your boat, just not down Main Street in Manayunk. That’s the message police are sending after arresting two men who used a raft as an alternate means of transportation down the flooded street Sunday.
CBS 3 reporter Dray Clark caught up with Pete and Pat, best friends and roommates from Manayunk, who paddled their way down the water covered street.
“I thought, Main Street floods a lot, go get a raft and float down,” said Pat, who admitted the idea was his.
“We thought it would be a good time and it turns out it is,” said Pete.
Minutes later, Philadelphia police stopped the men and hauled them away in handcuffs.
When Dray asked why the men were being arrested, he said the officers replied, “for lack of common sense.”
This site has a lot of information about Near Earth Objects worth looking at if it interests you at all http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/
NASA to Visit Asteroid Predicted to Hit Earth? There's a mountain-size asteroid on a potential collision course with Earth, and NASA has plans to pay it a visit.
The asteroid 1999 RQ36 made headlines last week with the announcement that the space rock could hit our planet in 2182. But a handful of scientists have had their eyes on this asteroid since 2007, planning a sample-return mission designed to help us better predict—and avoid—impact hazards.
The mission, called OSIRIS-Rex (Origins Spectral Interpretation Resource Identification Security Regolith Explorer), is one of two finalists in the current competition for funding under NASA's New Frontiers program, up against a proposed mission to land on Venus. The selected mission will be announced in summer 2011.
If OSIRIS-Rex gets the green light, the spacecraft will launch in 2016 with the goal of mapping and bringing back pieces of the asteroid.
(Related: "Hayabusa Spacecraft Returns With Fiery Show.")
The team wants to go to RQ36 specifically because it's thought to be rich in material that's remained unchanged since the early days of the solar system—and because the asteroid's orbit makes the space rock easy to reach.
"Being one of the easiest targets to get to coincidently means that it also can easily hit us, too," said Michael Drake, director of the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory at the University of Arizona, who would lead the OSIRIS-Rex team.
"When we were putting this mission proposal together, however, we really didn't connect those dots."
Asteroid Risk to Earth Still Highly Uncertain
Orbiting between 83 million and 126 million miles (133 million and 203 million kilometers) from the sun, RQ36 passes within about 280,000 miles (450,000 kilometers) of Earth's orbit. As a result, NASA has officially classified RQ36 as a "potentially hazardous asteroid."
The predictions that made waves last week suggest the 1,900-foot (580-meter) space rock has a one-in-a-thousand chance of hitting Earth in 2182.
While RQ36 would not create a global civilization-threatening impact, the asteroid would pack quite a punch, said Clark Chapman, a planetary scientist at Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado, who's not part of the OSIRIS-Rex or RQ36-assessment teams.
"It would be an enormous impact, like hundreds of the biggest nuclear bombs ever built exploding at once, creating a crater maybe 10 kilometers [6.2 miles] across."
But even with the new calculations, there's still way too much uncertainty about the asteroid's orbital path, said OSIRIS-Rex team leader Drake. To know if RQ36—or any space rock—really has our planet in its cross-hairs, we need a clearer understanding of what's called the Yarkovsky effect.
This effect occurs when an object absorbs sunlight. The resulting heat emanating from the object's surface gives it slight nudges. Over time, these tiny pushes can greatly affect an asteroid's orbital path.
(See "Asteroids Spin Faster Due to Solar Power, Studies Show.")
"While, for objects as big as Earth, such a small force is irrelevant, for those that are less than 20 kilometers [12.4 miles] in diameter, it becomes a significant enough force that it changes the orbit of the object," Drake said.
So far the Yarkovsky effect has been nearly impossible to measure from ground-based observations because of unknown variations in asteroids' surfaces and in their rotations and wobbles.
As a result, many of today's predictions of doomsday asteroids do not include this effect when calculating their orbits.
"This means that something that looks totally harmless right now may actually be the most probable thing to hit us," Drake said. "There is no doubt that it is a big effect and may in fact be the dominant effect throwing a wrench into the works."
Asteroid Visit to Keep Us From Being Fooled?
The proposed OSIRIS-Rex mission would reach RQ36 in 2019 and would start by mapping the asteroid in visible wavelengths through far-infrared wavelengths to figure out its basic chemical and mineralogical makeup.
The mission would also collect a sample of the asteroid's surface to return to Earth by 2023.
The hope is that OSIRIS-Rex can measure the Yarkovsky effect accurately for the first time and give us a better understanding of asteroid structure.
"Our mission would be able to tell us a lot about the nature of its surface and what its made of," Drake said. "There is no doubt that this information will be crucial to defending ourselves from an impact from this or any other asteroid."
Southwest Research Institute's Chapman added that, in addition to deciding whether RQ36 really poses a threat, we still need to figure out how we might nudge the space rock out of a potentially catastrophic trajectory.
"There are already indications from RQ36's shape that its surface is composed of loose materials," Chapman said. "That is good for retrieving a sample but poor for anchoring some device on the asteroid to move it."
(See "'Killer Asteroid' Debate Pits Gravity Tractors Against Bombs, Projectiles.")
In general, he added, "any close-up study of an asteroid will increase our appreciation of the physical nature of these diverse bodies and thus improve the likelihood that we won't be fooled when and if we try to interact with the body to move it." http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/08/100806-science-space-asteroid-impact-earth-osiris-rq36/
H1N1 pandemic is officially over but far from gone The World Health Organization on Tuesday declared the H1N1 flu pandemic over, a little more than a year after a spring flood of cases prompted a global effort to curb its wildfire transmission. "The new H1N1 virus has largely run its course," Director-General Margaret Chan said.
That doesn't mean that the so-called swine flu is gone. New Zealand is now grappling with local outbreaks. "Based on experience with past pandemics, we expect the H1N1 virus to take on the behavior of a seasonal influenza virus and continue to circulate for some years to come," Chan said in a statement.
Evidence suggests H1N1 already is behaving more like other flu viruses. It is no longer the dominant virus but is spreading along with others. One key factor is that many people are immune because they've been infected. Many others have been vaccinated.
The declaration draws to a close one of the most tumultuous chapters in public-health history, beginning with the springtime outbreak of a disease that usually strikes in the fall and winter. The virus hopscotched across the country, taking its heaviest toll among healthy young adults, pregnant women, people with neuromuscular disorders and those with other medical problems, including obesity.
A rush to produce a vaccine stalled until manufacturers finished filling their orders for seasonal flu vaccine and overcame production problems. The first doses began trickling out in November, burdening health officials with tricky decisions about whom to vaccinate first. Vaccine is now abundant, and in April, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said H1N1 will be used in the mix of three viruses in the 2010-2011 flu vaccine.
Bill Hall of the Department of Health and Human Services said federal health officials are still urging people to get vaccinated. "H1N1 is still out there," he said. "It can still affect people, especially young people and pregnant women."
