Growing numbers of patients are being denied treatment for conditions such as loss of sight, arthritis and infertility as the NHS increasingly rations healthcare in order to save money, research by the Guardian shows.
Services for patients with mental health problems and addictions and those who need physiotherapy after accidents are being scaled back, while operations to fix hernias or remove cataracts or varicose veins are either being refused or delayed.
Source: SFGate
A day after Defense Secretary Robert Gates suggested that American troops could remain here for years, tens of thousands of protesters allied with Muqtada al-Sadr, the radical anti-American Shiite cleric, flooded the streets demanding an end to the American military presence.
The protests were scheduled before Gates' comments - made Friday during a visit to troops in northern Iraq - although his statements may have fueled some of the day's fervor. The protesters were whipped up by comments drafted by al-Sadr, who sent a message to the crowd threatening to reconstitute his militia, the Mahdi Army, if the American military did not leave this year.
The U.S. Navy used a laser developed in Redondo Beach by Northrop Grumman Corp. to demonstrate how the weapon can defend a ship against small boats, the company and military branch said Friday.
The open ocean tests were conducted between October of last year and this month at the Pacific Ocean Test Range near San Nicolas Island off the Central California coast.
The at-sea tests "validated the potential to provide advanced self-defense" that ships can use to keep threatening small boats at a "safe distance," the Navy said in a statement.
The world economy needs a new global reserve currency to help prevent trade imbalances that are reflected in the national debt of the U.S., said Nobel-prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz.
A “global system” is needed to replace the dollar as a reserve currency and help avoid a weakening of U.S. credit quality, said Stiglitz, a professor at Columbia University in New York. The dollar fell to an almost 15-month low against the euro last week, and the U.S. trade deficitwidened more than forecast in January to the highest level in seven months.
Naples will join other Florida cities in a statewide protest against red light camera ticketing.
Locally, the protest is from 5:30 to 7 p.m. Tuesday near the intersection of Pine Ridge Road and U.S. 41.
Liberty groups throughout the state are organizing the simultaneous event to bring attention to red light ticketing. The Libertarian Party of Florida, Campaign for Liberty, Florida Civil Rights Association, and multiple tea party groups are among the event's organizers.
Participants of the red light camera protest are urging citizens to contact their state legislators and tell them to support SB 672 and HB 149, a law that would ban red light cameras in Florida.
… A month into the crisis, the utility acknowledges,there is no end in sight. …
Some Japanese experts now say the effort is in danger of failing unless Japan seeks more help from international experts to bring it to an end. Tetsunari Iida, an engineer-turned-industry critic, said the situation is “beyond the reach” of Japan’s closely knit nuclear establishment. …
[E]xperts say the overheated fuel rods are likely to have suffered extensive damage, and there is a complication for seemingly every advance. …
Tokyo Electric officials told CNN they can’t say when they’ll be able to restore those normal cooling. …
Satoshi Sato, a Japanese nuclear industry consultant, called the current line of attack a “waste of effort.” Plant instruments are likely damaged and unreliable because of the intense heat that was generated, and pumping more water into the reactors is only making the contamination problem worse, he said.
“There is no happy end with their approach,” Sato told CNN. “They must change the approach. That’s something I’m sure of 100 percent.”
After the 1986 Chernobyl accident, the world’s worst to date, the Soviet Union encased the plant’s damaged reactor in a massive concrete sarcophagus. Iida said Fukushima Daiichi’s reactors remain too hot to pour concrete, but he suggested pouring a slurry of minerals and sand over them to carry away heat before encasing them. …
Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader, has accepted a "road map" for a ceasefire with rebels, according to a delegation of African leaders.
The announcement followed a meeting between the leaders and Gaddafi on Sunday in Tripoli, the Libyan capital, just hours after NATO air raids targeted his tanks, helping the rebels push back government forces who had been advancing quickly towards their eastern stronghold.
Cairo’s central Tahrir Square was closed to traffic as dozens of protesters barricaded several entrances a day after it was forcibly evacuated by security forces and soldiers.
Groups of protesters lay in makeshift tents or explained their demands to passersby in the square, which was at the heart of 18 days of protests that toppled former president Hosni Mubarak.
“We want to see court rulings against the people who were running this country,” said 31-year-old Mahmoud Youssef, who owns a clothing store. “We want speedy trials. We want to feel that something is being done.”
CAIRO (Reuters) - Former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, breaking a two-month silence, said Sunday that accusations of corruption against his family were lies and he had the right to defend his reputation.
In his first public comments since being ousted from power on February 11, Mubarak said information sent to Egypt's public prosecutor would show he owns no financial assets or real estate abroad.
Details of bank accounts owned by his sons Alaa and Gamal would disprove any suspicions of profiteering and illegal gains.
(CNSNews.com) - The federal debt increased $54.1 billion in the eight days preceding the deal made by President Barack Obama, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D.-Nev.) and House Speaker John Boehner (R.-Ohio) to cut $38.5 billion in federal spending for the remainder of fiscal year 2011, which runs through September.
The debt was $14.2101 trillion on March 30, according to the Bureau of the Public Debt, and $14.2642 on April 7.
How high will they go?
Gasoline prices, already too high for most people's liking a month ago, have continued to soar and seem to be closing in inexorably on their record high above $4 a gallon.
And while most petroleum market-watchers remain convinced that political upheaval in the Middle East and ensuing speculation on the commodities markets are behind the price increase, evidence suggests that there may be another cause that's even less likely to go away anytime soon.
On Friday morning, according to travel club AAA Midatlantic and the Oil Price Information Service, the average price for a gallon of regular unleaded in the Richmond-Petersburg metro area was $3.642. That was up from $3.625 the day before, from $3.50 a week earlier, from $3.406 a month ago and from $2.766 on the same day last year. It's still below the all-time high of $4.006 set in July 2008, but it's close enough to be causing real pain at the pump.
A black man in southern Illinois has been charged with conveying false threats to city officials, for allegedly penning letters signed as "KKK warnings."
In November of 2006, the town of O'Fallon, Illinois's police department received the following letter,according to CBS in St. Louis: "Get all the blacks from Chevy Chase Apartments from out of O'Fallon before we burn the hole [sic] complex down. KKK warning."
Ten days later, a similar letter arrived at City Hall. "Get all the blacks out of O'Fallon before we start burning the[ir] houses down. KKK warning," read the second letter, the Belleville News-Democrat reports.
Justin Lamar Kidd, a 28-year-old African-American living in O'Fallon, was arrested in the case on Wednesday, and indicted by a federal grand jury on two counts of maliciously conveying a false threat,as KSDK writes. He faces up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine on each charge.
Many buildings were damaged and over 3.6 million households are without electric power.
Thursday's quake did not change the status of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, crippled in the March 11 earthquake, but it caused a power supply interruption to a different nuclear plant and a uranium enrichment facility.
The search is continuing for victims of the tsunami that struck Japan's north-east coast almost a month ago, while officials said they hoped to stop pumping radioactive water from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant into the sea.
More than 20,000 Japanese troops and 110 from the US conducted land, sea and air searches for the thousands of victims whose bodies have yet to be recovered
Radiation from Japan has been detected in drinking water in 13 more American cities, and cesium-137 has been found in American milk—in Montpelier, Vermont—for the first time since the Japan nuclear disaster began, according to data released by the Environmental Protection Agency late Friday.
Milk samples from Phoenix and Los Angeles contained iodine-131 at levels roughly equal to the maximum contaminant level permitted by EPA, the data shows. The Phoenix sample contained 3.2 picoCuries per liter of iodine-131. The Los Angeles sample contained 2.9. The EPA maximum contaminant level is 3.0, but this is a conservative standarddesigned to minimize exposure over a lifetime, so EPA does not consider these levels to pose a health threat.
The cesium-137 found in milk in Vermont is the first cesium detected in milk since the Fukushima-Daichi nuclear accident occurred last month. The sample contained 1.9 picoCuries per liter of cesium-137, which falls under the same 3.0 standard.
It's no accident they're meeting on the very same site as the Bretton Woods Conference -- formally United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference -- that met from July 1-22, 1944, during World War II to plan the postwar financial world after the expected defeat of Germany and Japan.
A biologist has inadvertently made history after becoming the first person to pass on an insect-borne virus to another human by sexual contact.
Researcher Brian Foy contracted the Zika virus, which causes severe fatigue and joint pain, while on a field trip to Senegal.
Five days after his return he fell ill, followed by his wife Joy who started showing symptoms too.
A 15-month-old boy was rushed to a hospital after he was accidentally served alcohol in a kids' meal at a Michigan Applebee’s, MyFoxDetroit.com reports.
Taylor Dill-Reese, the boy’s mother, said her son started acting strangely Friday at the Madison Heights restaurant after drinking from his sippy cup what she thought was apple juice. When Dill-Reese tasted the drink, it turns out it was margarita mix, according to MyFoxDetroit.com.
(Reuters) - Scientists confirmed on Thursday that they have discovered oil on dead dolphins found along the U.S. Gulf Coast, raising fresh concerns about the effects of last year's BP oil spill on sea life.
Fifteen of the 406 dolphins that have washed ashore in the last 14 months had oil on their bodies, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists said during a conference call with reporters.
BENGHAZI, Libya – NATO launched air strikes against Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi's troops in the stricken port city of Misrata on Sunday after regime forces killed at least 11 people there over the weekend, rebels said.
And in Brussels, an alliance official confirmed to AFP that NATO warplanes had destroyed 11 regime tanks on the road to the eastern Libyan town of Ajdabiya and another 14 tanks near Misrata.
Scientists from Britain and America visited the chemical weapons facility as it was being built in August 2006.
The cable, a copy of which was leaked to the WikiLeaks website and seen by The Daily Telegraph, detailed a visit by the scientists to a military facility in Tajura, on the outskirts of Tripoli.
CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt's ruling generals said on Saturday they were ready to use force to end protests in Tahrir Square after troops cracked down on demonstrators overnight and sparked violence that medical sources said killed two people.
Soldiers and police had used tasers and batons to try to drive out protesters from the square, the epicenter of protests that toppledHosni Mubarak on February 11. Gunshots echoed across the square in the overnight operation.
MAPLETON, Iowa -- A small Iowa town remains barricaded after a tornado destroyed much of it Saturday evening, and no one is being allowed back into the city.
Monona County Sheriff's Deputy Roger Krohn told the Sioux City Journal as much as 60 percent of the town of Mapleton may have been damaged or destroyed.
BEIJING (Reuters) – China said it was willing to discuss its differences on human rights "with mutual respect" with the U.S. on Saturday after rejecting a recent official report from Washington as interference in its internal affairs.
"China would like to conduct dialogue on the basis of equality and mutual respect. But China resolutely opposes using the issue of human rights to interfere in China's internal affairs," Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said in a statement posted on the ministry's website www.fmprc.gov.cn.
