Mixed advice in Europe over faulty breast implants

Logo on the gate of the entrance PIP (Poly Implant Prothese) factory, in La Seyne sur Mer, southern France, Friday, Jan.6, 2012. France wants the European Union to stiffen its rules on authorizing medical devices amid a breast implant scandal involving a French company and affecting tens of thousands of women worldwide, the health minister said Thursday. The implants were pulled from the market last year in several countries in and beyond Europe due to fears they could rupture and leak silicone into the body. (AP Photo/Claude Paris)

Logo on the gate of the entrance PIP (Poly Implant Prothese) factory, in La Seyne sur Mer, southern France, Friday, Jan.6, 2012. France wants the European Union to stiffen its rules on authorizing medical devices amid a breast implant scandal involving a French company and affecting tens of thousands of women worldwide, the health minister said Thursday. The implants were pulled from the market last year in several countries in and beyond Europe due to fears they could rupture and leak silicone into the body. (AP Photo/Claude Paris)

A woman covers her face with her breast implants certificate outside the civil court in Caracas, Venezuela, Friday, Jan. 6, 2012. According to lawyer Emilia De Leon, around 400 women affected by breast implants made by the defunct French brand Poly Implant Prothese, PIP, filed Friday a request for an injunction against the implants' distributors in Venezuela, demanding that they cover their medical expenses. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

Equipments used to manufacture silicone gel breast implants are seen near boxes of breast implants, in the abandoned Poly Implant Prothese, P factory in La Seyne sur Mer, southern France, Friday, Jan. 6, 2012. France wants the European Union to stiffen its rules on authorizing medical devices amid a breast implant scandal involving a French company and affecting tens of thousands of women worldwide, the health minister said Thursday. The implants were pulled from the market last year in several countries in and beyond Europe due to fears they could rupture and leak silicone into the body. (AP Photo/Claude Paris)

Anyoly Suarez holds, on one hand, her breast implants certificate and on the other a breast silicone implant, from the French brand Poly Implant Prothese, PIP, that was removed from her body because it was damaged, outside the civil court in Caracas, Venezuela, Friday, Jan. 6, 2012. According to lawyer Emilia De Leon, around 400 women affected by breast implants made by PIP, filed Friday a request for an injunction against the implants' distributors in Venezuela. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

Maria Perez, 50, shows photos of an ultrasound scan of one of her faulty French-made breast silicone implants with a fissure outside the civil court in Caracas, Venezuela, Friday, Jan. 6, 2012. According to lawyer Emilia De Leon, around 400 women affected by breast implants made by the defunct French brand Poly Implant Prothese, PIP, filed Friday a request for an injunction against the implants' distributors in Venezuela, demanding that they cover their medical expenses. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

LONDON (AP) ? European health authorities issued widely different recommendations Friday in dealing with potentially faulty French-made breast implants, with Germany and the Czech Republic following France in recommending their removal, while Britain insisted there isn't enough evidence to suggest they should be taken out in all cases.

Germany's Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices said on Friday it was recommending the removal of PIP breast implants "as a precautionary measure," while the Czech health ministry said about 2,000 Czech women with potentially faulty implants should have them removed.

But British Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said Friday that the U.K. had found no link between the implants ? manufactured with non-medical grade silicone by the now-defunct French company Poly Implant Prothese, or PIP ? and cancer.

However, his ministry said that silicone used by PIP "should not have been implanted in women in the first place," and offered to provide examinations and possible removals ? in instances where doctors say they are necessary.

Women in Britain who had PIP implants fitted for medical reasons ? mainly former cancer patients ? by the state-funded National Health Service, or women who used a private cosmetic surgery clinic which no longer exists would be offered an assessment, and could have the implants removed for free if doctors believed it necessary, Lansley said.

Britain's NHS does not provide cosmetic surgery without a medical reason.

Lansley called on private medical centers to offer the same deal to patients who had paid for private sector cosmetic surgery.

"There is not sufficient evidence to recommend routine removal," he said, but added that Britain believed "private health care providers have a moral duty to offer the same service to their patients that we will offer to NHS patients."

Germany's drugs and medical devices institute said that its new advice went beyond a Dec. 23 recommendation that women affected should have their implants checked for possible ruptures. It said the change followed new advice from experts who had warned that silicon from such implants can leak over time even if there is no rupture.

"How urgent a removal is in any given case depends essentially on how long the patient has carried the implant," the institute's chairman, Walter Schwerdtfeger, said in a statement.

The institute said it didn't have information on how many women received such implants in Germany.

PIP's website says the company exported to more than 60 countries and was one of the world's leading implant makers. The silicone-gel implants in question were not sold in the United States.

France has said it will pay for some 30,000 French women to have their implants removed, after more than 1,000 ruptures of the PIP implants, which were pulled from the market in several countries in Europe and beyond due to fears they could rupture and leak silicone into the body. Colombia and Venezuela have made similar offers.

France's Health Safety Agency says the suspect PIP implants appear to be more rupture-prone than other types. Investigators also say PIP sought to save money by using industrial silicone instead of medical silicone.

According to estimates by national authorities, over 42,000 women in Britain received the implants, more than 30,000 in France, 9,000 in Australia and 4,000 in Italy. Nearly 25,000 of the implants were sold in Brazil.

Australia's medical watchdog, however, says health officials had found no evidence that the PIP implants had an increased risk of rupture in Australian women, and said lab testing of the silicone gel used indicated it was nontoxic to nearby tissue even if the implant did rupture.

In Venezuela, lawyer Emilia De Leon confirmed that about 400 Venezuelan women are suing companies that sold them PIP implants and demanding the firms cover medical expenses to have the products removed.

Lansley said Britain and France were cooperating over the issue and planned to consult other European countries in the hope of preventing similar problems in the future.

In the Czech Republic ? where the implants were banned in 2010 ? the country's health ministry said it would negotiate with the country's health insurers on how to cover the cost of removals.

Those women who refuse to have the implants removed should undergo regular health checks, the ministry said in a statement. "No imminent risk of serious health problems has been proven," the ministry said.

____

Associated Press Writers Karel Janicek in Prague and Geir Moulson in Berlin contributed to this report

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/bbd825583c8542898e6fa7d440b9febc/Article_2012-01-06-EU-Europe-Breast-Implants/id-00be94bc44c44ec1b38ad6ca16bdc313

papelbon anita hill penn state football schedule carrier classic j edgar hoover j edgar hoover jonathan papelbon

Kayaker finds swimming dog that fled fatal crash (AP)

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. ? A man kayaking in the Gulf of Mexico rescued an injured dog that was swimming offshore after fleeing when his owner was struck and killed by a car.

The bizarre and sad tale unfolded Saturday afternoon on Siesta Key, a bucolic island community about 40 miles south of St. Petersburg that boasts some of Florida's most beautiful white sand beaches.

According to the Florida Highway Patrol, 53-year-old Donna Chen was jogging with her dog Barney, a Hungarian Vizsla.

As the pair jogged down the sidewalk, patrol officers said 22-year-old Blake Talman drove away from the nearby beach while drunk, got into one crash, and then drove away. That's when he struck Chen and her dog, officers said.

Chen died at the scene, but the dog ran away.

Later that afternoon, Rory O'Connor ? a tourist from Bellingham, Wash. ? was kayaking and fishing near Siesta Key when he spotted a dog swimming about a half mile offshore in the blue water.

"I pulled him into the kayak and he was really scared," said O'Connor. "He was shaking a lot. Had a bunch of wounds on his leg and was bleeding." O'Connor captured the rescue on a video camera that he uses to record his fishing adventures.

O'Connor took the dog ashore. His sister, who was on the beach with her family, identified the canine as a Vizsla and suggested the dog might have a microchip. The family then took the dog to a nearby vet.

The dog did have a microchip, and the veterinarian's office contacted Chen's family ? and learned about the accident. It's still a mystery how or why the dog ended up a mile from where the crash happened and in the water.

O'Connor said Barney is recovering, and said he is thankful that the dog is back with the Chen family.

"We thought the dog was a very special dog," O'Connor told The Associated Press during a phone interview Tuesday.

Authorities say Talman was charged with DUI manslaughter and is being held at the Sarasota County Jail without bail. It's unclear whether he has retained an attorney. Police declined to comment on the dog because the case is a vehicular homicide and is under investigation.

___

Follow Tamara Lush on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tamaralush

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/mexico/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120111/ap_on_re_us/us_dog_found_in_water

gop debate live gop debate live nome alaska nome alaska alaska map bil keane storm in alaska

Engineers call for grounding of A380 after cracks found in wings

Gadling:

The Daily Mail reports this evening that cracks found in the wing sections of several Airbus A380 jumbo jets have led to deep concern among a group of Australian aircraft engineers. Calling for the grounding of all A380 aircraft, the group highlighted recent faults uncovered in the wing structures of several Singapore Airlines and Qantas jets in their complaint.

Read the whole story: Gadling

'; var coords = [-5, -72]; // display fb-bubble FloatingPrompt.embed(this, html, undefined, 'top', {fp_intersects:1, timeout_remove:2000,ignore_arrow: true, width:236, add_xy:coords, class_name: 'clear-overlay'}); });

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/09/engineers-call-for-ground_n_1195579.html

academy barnes and noble nook 12 days of christmas a christmas carol arkansas football player dies anne mccaffrey anne mccaffrey

Obama Backers In New Hampshire Ask: 'Why Are You In?'

'I'm in because he brought the troops home,' read one poster in the Obama campaign office in Manchester.
By Gil Kaufman, with reporting by Sway Calloway

Obama supporters in New Hampshire
Photo: Getty Images

MANCHESTER, New Hampshire — "I'm in because we are the change we've been waiting for."

"I'm in because I want my grandchildren to know what polar bears are."

"I'm in because the power is in the voice of the youth."

Those are a few of the handwritten signs penned by volunteers for the Obama 2012 re-election as part of a "Why Are You In?" wall aimed at inspiring them to get out the vote during Tuesday's (January 10) primary. While most of the attention has been focused on the squabbling among the Republican White House hopefuls in the Granite State, as in last week's Iowa caucus, the Obama team here has been hard at work training volunteers, making calls and reaching out to the state's legendary independent voters and committed Democrats to remind them to come out on Tuesday.

It's part of an effort to keep the president's supporters fired up and ready to go for the general election in November, and 19-year-old volunteer Kathieya Odiah said the chance to see how a campaign works has been eye-opening. "The Obama campaign is basically about having volunteers and having a grassroots campaign, so when we have volunteers come in, we always have them make posters and notes about why they come here for Obama," said Odiah, one of a number of Quinnipiac University students who will spend several weeks of their winter break working for Obama 2012.

She pointed to one of the signs she wrote, "I'm in because he brought troops home," explaining that she felt strongly about the president ending the war in Iraq.

The Manchester office, the largest of seven such locations around the state, has housed hundreds of volunteers over the past few months, and during a visit from MTV's Power of 12 team on Tuesday afternoon, young volunteers were sprawled on couches, on the floor and across several rooms as they clutched their call sheets and reached out to remind voters to make it to the polls before they closed at 8 p.m.

Odiah's friend and fellow volunteer, Long Island, New York's Morgan Farra, 20, said she's in because the president has helped make college affordable for students like her by increasing the number of Pell grant recipients by 3 million so far. "It's really important to me because if you don't have an education, you're missing out on one of the greatest experiences of your life," she said.

Inspired by the unprecedented grassroots campaign run by Obama in 2008, 19-year-old Natalie Deduck said she has been putting in the 10- to 12-hour days at the Manchester office because she knows the importance of starting early and strong in order to rally the troops again. Jameson Cherilus, 22, is typical of the office's volunteers. He started his day around 8 a.m. outside an elementary school, where he held up signs for the president and reminded primary voters that Obama was on the ballot before hitting the office for a long day of phone calls.

"I'm here because President Obama supports small business," read another sign that shouted out Flanders Fish Market in East Lyme, Connecticut.

"It's been pretty hard getting my ... friends involved in the campaign [because] they honestly don't understand how important it is to start now even though it's only January," said Odiah about the challenges she's faced while making calls in Manchester and speaking to her peers about what she's doing. "We have to explain to people that we need to start now.

"[Once] Republicans choose who they're going to have for their candidate, they're already going to have half of the votes. ... Yeah, [Obama's] going to win the primary, but this is a dry run. This is our way of knowing this is what it's going to look like in November. It's hard."

MTV is on the scene in New Hampshire! Check back here around the clock for up-to-the-minute coverage on the primary caucuses, and stick with PowerOf12.org throughout the presidential election season.

Related Videos

• New Hampshire Primary Sparks Youth Conversation

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1677058/new-hampshire-obama-supporters.jhtml

narwhals narwhals gmail app gmail app phentermine port of oakland grand theft auto 5

[NY Baseball Digest] - Listen: Kicking of 2012 With the Hall of Fame at 9pm

Sorry, Readability was unable to parse this page for content.

Source: http://sportspyder.com/teams/new-york-yankees/articles/5582115

geoffrey mutai wes welker fred davis fred davis fracking fracking drosselmeyer

Spasticity gene finding provides clues to causes of nerve cell degeneration

Monday, January 9, 2012

The discovery of a gene that causes a form of hereditary spastic paraplegia (HSP) may provide scientists with an important insight into what causes axons, the stems of our nerve cells, to degenerate in conditions such as multiple sclerosis.

In the Journal of Clinical Investigation today, an international team of scientists led by Dr Evan Reid at the University of Cambridge, and Dr Stephan Zuchner from the University of Miami, report that mutations in the gene known as 'reticulon 2' on chromosome 19 cause a form of HSP, a condition characterised by progressive stiffness and contraction (spasticity) of the legs, caused by selective and specific degeneration of axons

The team identified three mutations in the reticulon 2 gene as causing a type of HSP ? in one case, this mutation included an entire deletion of the gene. In addition, the researchers showed that reticulon 2 interacts with another gene, spastin. Mutations in this latter gene cause the most common form of hereditary spastic paraplegia.

Reticulon 2 provides the genetic code for a reticulon protein that is a member of a family of proteins recently shown to play a key role in shaping the endoplasmic reticulum. The endoplasmic reticulum is a network of interconnected sheets and tubules that extends throughout the cytoplasm in nearly all cells. It has a number of functions, including protein synthesis, calcium signalling and regulation of other components of the cell. Recent data suggest that the sheets are involved in protein synthesis, whereas the tubules are specialised to carry out the other functions.

This new study provides the most direct evidence to date that defects in how the endoplasmic reticulum is shaped and formed could underlie axon degeneration. When axons degenerate, signals are unable to pass through the nerve cells, leading to a breakdown of communication within the central nervous system. This is common in degenerative diseases of the nervous system, such as multiple sclerosis.

"Our work highlights important new disease mechanisms, which may provide a platform for us to study how axons are damaged in devastating illnesses such as HSP, and perhaps even in multiple sclerosis, which in some cases is very similar to HSP," explains Dr Reid, a Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow in Clinical Science. "But we must not forget how this work may immediately directly benefit families affected by hereditary spastic paraplegia, for whom the discovery now opens up the possibility of genetic counselling and testing."

###

Wellcome Trust: http://www.wellcome.ac.uk

Thanks to Wellcome Trust for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

This press release has been viewed 66 time(s).

Source: http://www.labspaces.net/116564/Spasticity_gene_finding_provides_clues_to_causes_of_nerve_cell_degeneration

courtney stodden drake take care herman cain accuser herman cain accuser election day joe frazier where do i vote

Feds charge ex-Kosovo man in Fla. Islamic plot

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) ? A 25-year-old man from the former Yugoslavia was charged with plotting a radical Islamic attack on crowded locations around Tampa, including nightclubs and a sheriff's office, with a car bomb, assault rifle and other explosives, federal authorities said Monday.

The U.S. Department of Justice said Sami Osmakac, a naturalized American citizen born in Kosovo, recorded an eight minute video shortly before his arrest explaining why he wanted to bring terror to his "victims' hearts" in the Tampa Bay area.

In the video, according to the federal complaint, Osmakac is seen cross-legged on the floor with a pistol in his hand and an AK-47 behind him. Osmakac said in the video that Muslim blood was more valuable than that of people who do not believe in Islam, according to the complaint. He said he wanted "payback" for wrong that was done to Muslims, the complaint said.

There is no indication that Osmakac planned to attack the Republican National Convention, which will be held in Tampa in August, federal authorities said.

Osmakac was arrested Saturday. His first appearance in federal court was scheduled for 2 p.m. Monday.

Authorities say Osmakac, from Pinellas Park, Fla. ? a small city west of Tampa ? was charged with one count of attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction.

U.S. Attorney Robert O'Neill thanked the local Muslim community for assistance in the investigation, without elaborating.

FBI agents arrested Osmakac on Saturday after he allegedly bought explosive devices and firearms from an undercover agent. The firearms and explosives were rendered inoperable by law enforcement.

Federal officials say a confidential source told them in September 2011 that Osmakac walked into the source's business looking for al-Qaida flags. The confidential source then hired Osmakac and was in constant contact with federal officials and audio or video taped their conversations.

Two months later, the federal complaint said, Osmakac and the confidential source discussed and identified potential targets in Tampa that Osmakac wanted to attack.

Osmakac allegedly asked the source for help getting firearms and explosives for the attacks, and the source put him in touch with an undercover FBI employee.

On Dec. 21, Osmakac met with the undercover agent and allegedly told the agent that he wanted to buy an AK-47-style machine gun, Uzi submachine guns, high capacity magazines, grenades and an explosive belt. During a later meeting, Osmakac gave the agent a $500 down payment for the items.

"According to the complaint, Osmakac also asked the undercover employee whether he/she could build bombs that could be placed in three different vehicles and detonated remotely, near where Osmakac would conduct a follow-up attack using the other weapons he requested," the press release said. "The undercover employee said he/she could possibly provide explosives for one vehicle. Osmakac also allegedly said that he wanted an explosive belt constructed to kill people."

On Jan. 1, Osmakac told the agent that he wanted to bomb nightclubs, the operations center of the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office and a business in Tampa, Florida.

Osmakac told the undercover FBI agent that he wanted to detonate a car bomb and use the explosive belt to "get in somewhere where there's a lot of people" and take hostages.

Osmakac told the agent that after he took hostages he wanted to demand something from the "kuffar" ? an Arabic word that means infidels or disbelievers of Islam, federal authorities said.

According to the affidavit, he also stated, "Honestly, I would love to go for the Army people, but their bases are so locked up, I have to do something else."

Osmakac said he wanted to take down the bridges that link the city of Tampa to neighboring Pinellas County.

"This will crush the whole economy," he allegedly said to the agent. "This would crush everything man, they would have no more food coming in. They would, nobody would have work."

During that meeting, the agent told Osmakac he could always change his mind about his plot.

"According to the complaint, Osmakac immediately shook his head in the negative and stated, 'We all have to die, so why not die the Islamic way?' " the press release stated.

___

Tamara Lush can be reached on Twitter at http://twitter.com/tamaralush

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2012-01-09-Bomb%20Plot%20Arrest/id-65e469a110b2485888dcb2875e7062b3

toyota recall order of operations carrie underwood eric church sara evans lionel richie cma awards