Exercise has beneficial influence on over 180 genes, including those that repair DNA and suppress tumor growth, and this might lead to prevention or delay of prostate cancer progression, a recent study shows.
The findings of the new study will be presented on Friday at a meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology in San Francisco. These data should be viewed as preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal.
“There are many reasons to exercise. Here’s yet another great reason to exercise and it may offer a prostate cancer-specific benefit,” said June Chan, associate professor of epidemiology and biostatistics, and urology at the University of California, San Francisco.
Prostate genes from 70 men with low-risk prostate cancer were compared to normal prostate genes from 70 men by Professor Chan’s team.
Researchers discovered a great difference between the expression of the genes in men who did sustained and moderate to hard activities, such as jogging, tennis or swimming for at least three hours a week, compared with genes in men who did less exercise.
Tumor-suppressor genes associated with breast cancer, BRCA1 and BRCA2 and the genes involved in DNA repair were highly expressed in men who did brisk exercise.
An energetic exercise results in benefits for breast cancer and colon cancer patients too.
However, the study was small and the results need to be confirmed by a larger survey on men who are undergoing active surveillance, and men with recurrence of their prostate cancer.
“If confirmed, the results suggest that vigorous physical activity might offer protection against prostate cancer progression,” Professor Chan said.
“This is an interesting, hypothesis-generating study that will require further testing and perhaps opens doors to exercise as part of future prostate cancer treatment, but it’s too soon to tell,” said Dr. Anthony D’Amico, chief of radiation oncology, prostate cancer expert from Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.
Walking in a brisk pace or running several times a week might prevent the death from prostate cancer.
The beneficial effect of exercise in prostate cancer progression was emphasized by another two studies published last year.
Men with prostate cancer who did 3 or more hours a week of brisk exercises had a 60% lower risk of death from prostate cancer, and around 50% lower risk of death from all illnesses, in contrast with the men who did less than one hour per week of energetic physical activity. These results were published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology in February 2011.
Also the men who walked at 3 miles (4.82 km) per hour or faster had about half the risk of cancer progression of the men who walked at two miles (3.21 km) per hour or less, showed a study published in Cancer Research in the May 2011.
“These studies suggested that some form of cardiopulmonary exercise might offer specific benefits for prostate cancer. However, the molecular mechanisms by which physical activity exerts this effect on prostate cancer remains unknown, ” Professor Chan said.
Advertising Standards Authority(ASA) in UK has announced a ban on the magazine advertisement for L’Oreal’s Revitalift Repair 10 in which Rachel Weisz appeared with perfectly smooth skin.
In fact, the image of the 41-year-old Oscar winning actress, who married Daniel Craig last year, had been digitally enhanced or airbrushed to even out her complexion.
ASA ruled the image “misleadingly exaggerated” the performance of the product.
The decision has been welcomed by Lib-Dem MP Jo Swinson, who is campaigning against the use of airbrushing and unrealistic images of beauty in advertising.
Rachel Weisz is not the first renowned beauty to have her image digitally enhanced to give a false impression of the benefits of using popular beauty products.
An advertisement for an Olay anti-aging product featuring Twiggy was banned in 2009. Last year L’Oreal advertisements featuring Julia Roberts and Christy Turlington were banned on the grounds they were misleading.
MP Jo Swinson, who is co-founder of the Campaign for Body Confidence, said: “The beauty and advertising industries need to stop ripping off consumers with dishonest images.
“The banning of this advert, along with the previous ASA rulings banning heavily retouched ads featuring Twiggy, Julia Roberts and Christy Turlington, should act as a wake-up call.
“Thankfully the advertising regulator has again acknowledged the fraudulent nature of excessive retouching.”
ASA banned magazine advertisement for L’Oreal’s Revitalift Repair 10 in which Rachel Weisz appeared with perfectly smooth skin
Jo Swinson said there was sound medical evidence that faked images cause harm.
“The Royal College of Psychiatrists has spoken out about the harmful influence of the media on body image and has highlighted the airbrushing and digital enhancement used to portray physical perfection as an area of concern,” she said.
“There needs to be much more diversity in advertising – different skin colors, body shapes, sizes and ages. Studies show that people want to see more authenticity from brands. Images can be aspirational without being faked.”
The fact that the image has been digitally manipulated is at odds with the actress’s stated view that performers should do away with artificial help to prolong their youth. It is not known whether she approved the changes.
Speaking to Harper’s Bazaar magazine in 2009, Jo Swinson called for a ban on Botox for actors, saying: “Acting is all about expression; why would you want to iron out a frown?”
In the same interview Jo Swinson mentioned that English women were much less worried about their physical appearance than those in the US.
The marketing for L’Oreal’s Revitalift range claims it makes the skin feel firmer, toned, and suppler. The ASA did not challenge these, however it was unhappy that the actress’s image was used to substantiate the claims that the “Skin looks smoother” and “Complexion looks more even”.
L’Oreal defended the way the image of the actress had been manipulated.
The company said: “The ad sought to represent Rachel Weisz as favorably as possible and therefore every effort had gone into ensuring the most flattering set-up.
“Rachel Weisz had been professionally styled and made-up and then lit and shot by a professional photographer in a studio setting.
“The photo was shot using a lot of light in order to make the picture more flattering and to reduce the appearance of imperfections in the ensuing image by giving the image a soft focus and lower resolution.”
L’Oreal admitted the image had been subsequently retouched.
The ASA said: “We considered that the image had been altered in a way that substantially changed her complexion to make it appear smoother and more even.
“We therefore concluded that the image in the ad misleadingly exaggerated the performance of the product.”
Manrico Giampedroni was the last person to be rescued from Italy’s shipwrecked Costa Concordia after 36 hours and he said he pounded on a wall with a frying pan to alert rescuers.
Manrico Giampedroni, the ship’s purser, waited 36 hours before being rescued from the belly of the ship.
The man has been released from hospital in Grosseto, Italy, where he was treated for injuries.
Manrico Giampedroni, 57, described falling through a door into the ship’s restaurant as he tried to save passengers.
“I remember ending up in the Milan restaurant… A door opened suddenly and I fell in,” he said, describing being trapped in the room as tables and chairs moved in the water.
“To get the rescuers’ attention, I used a pan to make some noise. From the windows, I could see the rescue teams and I tried to scream. When I saw the first fireman I embraced him. Those guys were incredible. In three hours I was out of there.”
Manrico Giampedroni was the last person to be rescued from Italy's shipwrecked Costa Concordia after 36 hours and he said he pounded on a wall with a frying pan to alert rescuers
The Costa Concordia ran aground off the Tuscan island of Giglio on 13 January, when the captain deviated from his planned route and struck a reef, creating a huge gash.
Some 4,200 passengers and crew were on board when the vessel capsized. A total of 17 bodies have been recovered and 16 others are missing but presumed dead.
On Tuesday civil protection officials called off the search for the missing in the submerged part of the ship because of safety concerns.
But they added that the search would continue where possible in the sections of the ship above water, in the waters nearby and along the coastline.
The ship’s captain, Francesco Schettino, is under house arrest while his actions are being investigated.
Francesco Schettino is accused of multiple manslaughter, causing a shipwreck, and abandoning ship before all passengers were evacuated. He denies the allegations.
Manrico Giampedroni said his experience had not put him off returning to work on cruise liners.
“As soon as I can, what I want more than anything, is to go back to work for Costa Cruises,” Manrico Giampedroni said.
The incredible pictures of an isolated Amazon tribe are the most detailed ever recorded of a previously uncontacted Indian tribe in the remote forests of Peru.
The pictures are taken in Manú National Park, south-eastern Peru, and show the daily life of a family from the Mashco-Piro tribe.
Campaign group Survival International has released images of the Mashco-Piro tribe, which lives near the Manú National Park.
The Mashco-Piro tribe is known to inhabit the park, but sightings of them have increased in recent months.
The tribe has had little if any peaceful contact with the outside world.
The Mashco-Piro is one of around just 100 known uncontacted tribes. They live a traditional life in the Peruvian forests and have little or no outside contact with the world.
Families within the tribes fashion tools from wood and other materials, including the teeth of animals.
In these pictures, the adults and children are wearing decorative loops around their wrists, knees and ankles – some of which can be used to carry tools.
The adult female is also wearing a form of skirt which is believed to be made from pulped tree bark fibres.
The danger of attempting to establish contact with tribes who choose to remain isolated has recently been confirmed after the death of an indigenous Matsigenka man.
Survival blames the change on gas and oil projects and illegal logging in the area, pushing the tribe into new lands.
The message that the Mashco-Piro tribe seems to be sending, however, is that they want to be left alone.
The Mashco-Piro is one of around just 100 known uncontacted tribes and its members live a traditional life in the Peruvian forests and have little or no outside contact with the world
“There’s been increasing conflict and violence against outsiders that are on their ancestral land,” Survival’s Peru campaigner Rebecca Spooner said.
That violence has included arrows being fired at tourists in passing boats, and a warning arrow – with no tip – being recently fired at a Manú park ranger.
Most recently, members of the tribe fired a lethal arrow at Nicolas “Shaco” Flores – a member of a different tribe who had been attempting to make formal contact with the Mashco-Piro for some two decades.
Nicolás “Shaco” Flores was shot in the heart by an arrow near the national park as he was leaving food and gifts for a small group of Mashco-Piro Indians – something he had been doing for the last 20 years.
An account of the attack by anthropologist Glenn Shepard underlines the fact that the tribe is fearful of forming ties with the world around them.
Glenn Shephard told Anthropology News: “Shaco’s death is a tragedy: he was kind, courageous and a knowledgeable man.
“He believed he was helping the Mashco-Piro. And yet in this tragic incident, the Mashco-Piro has once again expressed their adamant desire to be left alone.”
Clan members have also been blamed for a bow-and-arrow attack which left a forest ranger wounded in October.
One of the images was taken by a bird watcher in August. The other two were taken by Spanish archaeologist Diego Cortijo on November 16, six days before Flores was killed.
Diego Cortijo, a member of the Spanish Geographical Society, was visiting Nicolás “Shaco” Flores on an expedition in search of petroglyphs and said clan members appeared across the river, calling for him by name.
Nicolás “Shaco” Flores was able to communicate with the Mashco-Piro because he spoke two related dialects and had provided the clan with machetes and cooking pots.
The Mashco-Piro tribe is believed to number in the hundreds and lives in the park bordering Diamante, a community of around 200 people.
The clan that appeared along the river is believed to number around 60, including some 25 adults, according to Carlos Soria – a professor at Lima’s Catholic University.
Diego Cortijo said: “It seemed like they wanted to draw a bit of attention, which is a bit strange because I know that on other occasions they had attacked people.
“It seemed they didn’t want us to go near them, but I also know that the only thing that they wanted was machetes and cooking pots.”
It was at a respectful distance of 120 m that Diego Cortijo snapped pictures of the tribe using a telescope mounted on a camera, capturing the most detailed images ever taken of such “uncontacted” tribes, many of whom are detailed at a site of the same name.
Carlos Soria said: “The place where they are seen is one of heavy transit of river cargo and tourist passage, and so the potential for more violent encounters remains high.”
The Mashco-Piro are one of around 15 uncontacted tribes in Peru which together amount to an estimated 15,000 people living in jungles east of the Andes.
State authorities issued a directive in August barring boats from going ashore in the area.
But enforcing it has been difficult as there are few trained and willing local officials.
Rebecca Spooner suggested that the evident increase in violence could be abated by preserving the local tribes’ traditional lands.
“We’re asking the Peruvian government to do more to protect that land, which should be set aside for the uncontacted groups,” she said.
Researchers from the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and Columbia University Medical Center say that drinking just a single can of diet fizzy drink every day can increase the risk of a heart attack or stroke.
The study, published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, has suggested that just a couple of daily cans of the supposedly “healthier” carbonated drinks, such as lemonade or cola, can raise the risk of liver damage, as well as potentially causing diabetes and heart damage.
Researchers claim those who drink diet soft drinks are 43% more likely to have heart attacks, vascular disease or strokes than those who have none.
Previous analysis of soft drinks has shown that the soft drinks, which have a substantial amount of artificial sweeteners, can cause liver disease similar to that caused by chronic alcoholism.
“Diet” fizzy drinks are marketed as a healthy option in comparison to “full fat” alternatives as they have fewer calories.
Researchers claim those who drink diet soft drinks are 43 percent more likely to have heart attacks, vascular disease or strokes than those who have none
But their genuine health benefits remain unclear, with some research suggesting they trigger people’s appetites even more.
The U.S. research team studied the soft drink and diet soft drink consumption of 2,564 study participants over a 10-year period – along with their risk of stroke, heart attack and vascular death.
The researchers found those who drank diet soft drinks every day were 43% more likely to have suffered a “vascular” or blood vessel event than those who drank none, after allowing for pre-existing vascular conditions such as metabolic syndrome, diabetes and high blood pressure.
Dr. Hannah Gardener said: “Our results suggest a potential association between daily diet soft drink consumption and vascular outcomes.
“The mechanisms by which soft drinks may affect vascular events are unclear.”
She added, however, that the mechanisms by which soft drinks may affect “vascular events” are not clear, and that more research was needed into the subject before significant conclusions could be drawn about the health consequences of soft drink consumption.
Diet soft drinks often contain artificial sweeteners like aspartame, which has been linked to other health problems such as cancer.
Irish artist Frank Buckley decided to express his anger about the property boom and bust by building a house from more than a billion Euros of decommissioned notes.
In the lobby of the Glass House, an empty office building that stands as a relic to Ireland’s cataclysmic property bust, money is changing hands between an old woman and a 15-year-old girl.
“Go off there and get a couple of sweets for yourself,” says the woman, as she hands over a block of €50,000 ($65,000) notes.
“I should have brought my handbag in here, I could have made a fortune,” she jokes.
The money, which forms a pulped brick of shredded notes, is part of an art installation – and home – built by unemployed Dublin-based artist Frank Buckley.
Frank Buckley has invited strangers into the space in the hope that it will inspire debate on the state of Irish national debt and the meaning of currency.
Like many of his friends and acquaintances, Frank Buckley fell victim to Ireland’s economic crisis. At the height of the property boom, he bought a house on cheap credit.
Irish artist Frank Buckley decided to express his anger about the property boom and bust by building a house from more than a billion Euros of decommissioned notes
The artist wanted a place where he and his two children could live together with his wife, who had recently moved from Zimbabwe with four children of her own.
“I borrowed all that money, which was very much encouraged,” Frank Buckley says.
“I take responsibility for it but it was very easy for me to do.
“We were in this bubble, confidence was high, we were untouchable and within the space of two or three weeks it just took its toll.”
Frank Buckley had no fixed income and within months of buying the house found he couldn’t meet his mortgage repayments.
Under the financial strain, his marriage broke down and he moved into the shed at the back of the house as bailiffs came to take his furniture away.
His friends and acquaintances struggled too and a close friend, a property developer who had lost everything he owned, took his own life.
Staring at a stack of decommissioned notes he had acquired from a friend to use as confetti at his wedding ceremony he started questioning its real value.
“I thought, <<God, this is what this paper is doing to us?>>” he says.
Frank Buckley decided to create art that would bring the absurdity of the Irish economic situation to light and made paintings from the shredded notes and coins which he exhibited towards the end of last year.
Then the idea came to him to build a house.
“I was sitting outside the Glass House building waiting for a friend of mine to come out and I thought, <<Wouldn’t this be fantastic, to do a structure inside the building with the shredded notes?>>” he says.
The artist rang the building’s agent who had seen a review of his most recent exhibition and forwarded him to the owner who was immediately keen.
The mint agreed to supply him with more bricks of decommissioned notes. There was a vast amount of paperwork involved but mint officials were very accommodating and took care of it.
They have given the money to Frank Buckley on a loan basis and will dispose of it when he is finished.
Frank Buckley had never built a house before. “I got a hammer and nails and my brother brought down a generator and plugged it in. I had a light and I started from there,” he says.
The house is constructed from sheets of plywood and frames donated by a local DIY shop.
The outside walls are built from stacked bricks while inside, the shredded Euros are used to plaster the walls and carpet the floor. It has a double glazed window, a high security front door and a toilet.
Frank Buckley now lives in the house during the week, returning to the shed in his family’s back garden at the weekend.
Since he opened it to the public on Monday the house has received more than 300 visitors and he has been overwhelmed by the positive reaction to it.
But despite the success of the installation he is still struck daily by the poignancy of the Irish economic situation and recalls the reaction of his young visitor as she handled the block of useless notes.
“The girl said, <<If I could use this as money, I would get out of this country.>>” Frank Buckley says.
Scientists at University of California Berkeley have demonstrated a striking method to reconstruct words, based on the brain waves of patients thinking of those words.
The method, reported in PLoS Biology, relies on gathering electrical signals directly from patients’ brains.
Based on signals from listening patients, a computer model was used to reconstruct the sounds of words that patients were thinking of.
The technique may in future help comatose and locked-in patients communicate.
Several approaches have in recent years suggested that scientists are closing in on methods to tap into our very thoughts.
In a 2011 study, participants with electrodes in direct brain contact were able to move a cursor on a screen by simply thinking of vowel sounds.
A technique called functional magnetic resonance imaging to track blood flow in the brain has shown promise for identifying which words or ideas someone may be thinking about.
By studying patterns of blood flow related to particular images, Jack Gallant’s group at the University of California Berkeley showed in September that patterns can be used to guess images being thought of – recreating “movies in the mind”.
Now, Brian Pasley of the University of California Berkeley and a team of colleagues have taken that “stimulus reconstruction” work one step further.
“This is inspired by a lot of Jack’s work,” Dr. Brian Pasley said. “One question was… how far can we get in the auditory system by taking a very similar modelling approach?”
The team focused on an area of the brain called the superior temporal gyrus, or STG.
This broad region is not just part of the hearing apparatus but one of the “higher-order” brain regions that help us make linguistic sense of the sounds we hear.
The team monitored the STG brain waves of 15 patients who were undergoing surgery for epilepsy or tumours, while playing audio of a number of different speakers reciting words and sentences.
The trick is disentangling the chaos of electrical signals that the audio brought about in the patients’ STG regions.
To do that, the team employed a computer model that helped map out which parts of the brain were firing at what rate, when different frequencies of sound were played.
With the help of that model, when patients were presented with words to think about, the team was able to guess which word the participants had chosen.
The scientists at UC Berkeley were even able to reconstruct some of the words, turning the brain waves they saw back into sound on the basis of what the computer model suggested those waves meant
The scientists were even able to reconstruct some of the words, turning the brain waves they saw back into sound on the basis of what the computer model suggested those waves meant.
“There’s a two-pronged nature of this work – one is the basic science of how the brain does things,” said Robert Knight of UC Berkeley, senior author of the study.
“From a prosthetic view, people who have speech disorders… could possibly have a prosthetic device when they can’t speak but they can imagine what they want to say,” Prof. Robert Knight explained.
“The patients are giving us this data, so it’d be nice if we gave something back to them eventually.”
The authors caution that the thought-translation idea is still to be vastly improved before such prosthetics become a reality.
But the benefits of such devices could be transformative, said Mindy McCumber, a speech therapist at Florida Hospital in Orlando.
“As a therapist, I can see potential implications for the restoration of communication for a wide range of disorders,” she said.
“The development of direct neuro-control over virtual or physical devices would revolutionise ‘augmentative and alternative communication’, and improve quality of life immensely for those who suffer from impaired communication skills or means.”
Kristen Bell had a special guest at her last summer birthday party, her favorite animal, a sloth.
The actress appeared on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” with home video footage from her 31st birthday party, disclosing an unusual and cute side of her.
“Tomorrow at 4pm you can see the sensitive madness that is the inside of my brain,” she had tweeted the day before.
She told Ellen that her fiancé, Dax Shepard, told her she would receive for turning 31 a present “no one else will ever get in their life time“.
Then, when the day came she could not control her emotions. Dax Shepard arranged for a sloth to visit her on her birthday.
“The day of my birthday, we’re sitting in the living room and I hear a knock at the door. He says, ‘Your present is here. Why don’t you go grab the dogs and go in the back room?’… I had no context for knowing what it was, but I grabbed the dogs and walk into the back room of the house and I was immediately overcome and I thought, ‘There’s a sloth near. There’s a sloth here; it’s close; it’s going to happen,'” Kristen Bell said.
“And I didn’t know how to process that, because my entire life had been waiting for this moment,” she added.
It was all too much and she curled up on her bed and wept.
“I was sitting on my bed, knowing that my sloth is here, and I start to have a full-fledged panic attack. I don’t know how to compete with all this emotion so I just kind of crawl up on the bed and I’m crying so hard,” she said.
” Dax knocks on the door and he has a video camera and he’s like, “Surprise! I want you to come out into the … are you alright?”
“And he sees me basically fetal on the bed.”
“You’re supposed to see the sloth, and I’m supposed to film you but you haven’t even seen it yet,” Dax said to her.
“I knew it, I don’t know why. I knew it. I’m so excited,” she replied.
"I've been obsessed with sloths for as long as I can remember. They must be my spirit animal or something," said Kristen Bell.
Then Kristen Bell said she had much fun and joy meeting the jolly mammal, a female sloth.
Sloths are relatives of armadillos and anteaters.
“I was having a birthday party later that evening and they had set up a little habitat. Its a little jungle gym and she just hung out on the jungle gym for like three hours,” she said.
Sloths are Kristen’s great passion. “I’ve been obsessed with sloths for as long as I can remember. They must be my spirit animal or something. There’s nothing cuter than a baby sloth … OK, maybe a slow Loris. Maybe. On a good day, ” she told The Insider earlier in January 2012.
Kristen Bell, born on July 18, 1980, made her Broadway debut in 2001 as Becky Thatcher in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. She appeared in a lead role in the Spartan. She is known for the role in television series Veronica Mars (2004-2007). She has received a Satellite Award and Saturn Award.
At least 60 deaths are reported in eastern and central Europe due to freezing conditions caused by a cold snap over the last days.
Low temperatures, forcing some countries to deploy the army and set up emergency shelters, is set to continue to Friday, according to forecasters.
Most of the people – at least 30, mostly homeless – have died in Ukraine. Deaths have also been reported in Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, among others.
Temperatures plunged to -20C (-4F) on Monday.
Health officials in Ukraine say nearly 24,000 people have sought refuge in some 1,590 shelters over the past three days.
More than 600 people have sought treatment for frostbite and hypothermia during this time.
The authorities say they are planning to set up 150 more centres, as heavy snow was forecast in the region on Wednesday.
The death toll in Poland over recent days rose to 21 on Tuesday. The Interior Affairs Ministry said some had suffered carbon monoxide poisoning from faulty heaters, according to the Associated Press news agency.
Poland had been having a relatively mild winter, until temperatures dropped last Friday from just below freezing to -26C (-15F).
Malgorzata Wozniak of Poland’s interior ministry said elderly people and the homeless were among the dead, AP reports.
Troops in Romania were deployed last week to rescue those stranded in cars by blizzards
Polish forecasters have warned that temperatures could fall further during the week, to below -20C during the day and -30C at night.
At least eight people have died in Romania and five in Bulgaria.
Troops in Romania were deployed last week to rescue those stranded in cars by blizzards.
In Serbia, police reported that the snowy conditions had led to the deaths of a woman and two elderly men. Two other men, in their 70’s, are believed to be missing in the south of the country.
Reports say there were also deaths in Lithuania, Bosnia, Slovakia and the Czech Republic.
Elisabetta Canalis, George Clooney’s ex-girlfriend, has confirmed she has started a surprise romance with Jackass daredevil Steve-O.
Elisabetta Canalis, 33, confirmed the rumors as she leaned in for a kiss with Steve-O, 37, after having lunch together in Hollywood yesterday.
A day earlier they seemed coy and would not answer questions about their relationship status in a video posted on TMZ.
But Elisabetta Canalis and Steve-O certainly weren’t shy about showing their affection yesterday.
Elisabetta Canalis, who was dressed in a white maxi-dress, sat on Steve-O’s lap and at one point grabbed his backside.
Insiders say Steve-O’s sense of humor won her over.
“Steve makes Elisabetta laugh, and that’s her weakness,” a source tells Radar Online.
“That was her favorite thing about George Clooney-he was always cracking her up and playing practical jokes on her.”
The source adds: “Ever since Steve-O got sober, he’s very sensitive and introspective, so Elisabetta is getting the best of both worlds.
“They’re not serious yet, but they are definitely hanging out, and hooking up. They are trying to stay under the radar, so they mostly hang out at her place and watch movies and order in. But they also hit some low key restaurants around her neighborhood too.”
Elisabetta Canalis, 33, confirmed the rumors as she leaned in for a kiss with Steve-O, 37, after having lunch together in Hollywood yesterday
For nearly two years the Italian TV star Elisabetta Canalis was in the enviable position of dating one of Hollywood’s most eligible bachelors, George Clooney, 50.
But in June 2011, Elisabetta Canalis and George Clooney announced they had split. George Clooney is now dating former wrestler Stacey Keibler.
Steve-O – the London-born former stuntman whose real name is Steven Glover – is well-known for being part of the outrageous Jackass cast that made a name for themselves on MTV.
In March 2008, Steve-O was placed on 72-hour psychiatric hold after friends worried that he was a danger to himself.
His controversial stunts include lighting his head on fire, swallowing live goldfish and trying to vomit them up alive.
Both Elisabetta Canalis and Steve-O have competed in the US TV series, Dancing With the Stars.
Kim Kardashian posted a series of photos to her Twitter account to show her new hairdo after dyeing her locks a lighter shade.
Kim Kardashian, 31, was shooting a campaign for the Kardashian Kollection lingerie line, and she made sure she was the perfect advert for the range as she posed for her Twitter snaps in nothing but a coral colored bra.
The reality star amped up the sex appeal by posting a photo of herself wearing just the underwear, with the caption: “Photo shoot fresh! All about corals for spring swimwear.”
Kim Kardashian then sent an almost identical but slightly less revealing snap of herself in an untied fluffy white bathrobe, with her hair partially covering her cleavage.
The second shot was accompanied by the words: “Last shot of the day! On set of our Kardashian Kollection for Sears shoot!”
But while Kim Kardashian’s Twitter followers would have been focused on her ample curves, the businesswoman was more interested in her new hair color.
Kim Kardashian was shooting a campaign for the Kardashian Kollection lingerie line and she posed for her Twitter snaps in nothing but a coral colored bra
Shortly after the photo shoot, Kim Kardashian posted yet another photo to the social networking site.
Kim Kardashian’s assets were again clear for all to see, but the star simply asked her fans what they thought about her new hue.
The reality star wrote: “I dyed my hair lighter yesterday! I’m loving it! New hair color=new beginnings for me You like?”
But it hasn’t all been fun and photo shoots for Kim Kardashian after the star recently had to deal with a trespasser on her property, it has been reported.
According to TMZ, a stranger appeared at her Beverly Hills mansion over the weekend with several suitcases and requested to stay in her home.
TMZ claims it was told by a source that police officers were called to the house and the man in question told them he had a job interview lined up with the reality star.
The man was reportedly given a trespassing warning by the police, who then allegedly drove him back to the airport so that he could book a flight home.
Kim Kardashian was also using her famous curves to promote her latest venture earlier in the day, after she posed topless with her sisters Khloe and Kourtney in a campaign for their denim line.
The three sisters can be seen intertwined while wearing nothing but their range of jeans, another strand of the Kardashian Kollection for Sears.
Kim Kardashian was also using her famous curves to promote her latest venture earlier in the day, after she posed topless with her sisters Khloe and Kourtney in a campaign for their denim line
Kim Kardashian posted the racy image to her website and wrote: “Kourt, Khloe and I decided to go natural for our Kardashian Kollection denim shoot with Nick Saglimbeni and pose in only our favorite jeans! What do you think of the pic? I think it’s such a beautiful shot and Khloe and Kourtney both look so stunning! Xo”
They unveiled a campaign for the line last week, which saw each of them sporting a pair of jeans named after them, along with identical fitted white shirts.
However the reality stars then decided to generate further buzz for their denim line by releasing the new image, which shows them protecting their modesty with their arms as they pout seductively for the camera.
Insurance companies tend to apply greater prices on the car insurance policies for low-income people, a study published by the Consumer Federation of America shows.
“Lower-Income Households and the Auto Insurance Marketplace: Challenges and Opportunities” is the report wrote by Stephen Brobeck and J. Robert Hunter. They reviewed the literature from academics and regulators and added new findings from their research.
The cost of car insurance can be a heavier burden than the cost of the car, in certain cases. And this leads to economic implications, the authors say.
“There is much academic research that clearly shows that if you have ready access to a car, it dramatically improves your economic opportunities. The release of the report is just the beginning of our initiative to try to inform the country, particularly state regulators, who can do a great deal to mitigate the problems,” said Stephen Brobeck, executive director at the Consumer Federation of America.
The legislation prevents insurance companies to establish premiums on income base, but they have the possibility to take in consideration the driver’s education, occupation, home address, and credit rating.
According to the Consumer Federation of America, these data can replace the information on income and until now there were no studies on what impact has this combination of factors on the poor persons.
“We think education, occupation and credit scores are surrogates for income. Occupations that have no driving risk affiliated with them but do have lower incomes tend to pay more, so it raises serious questions,” said J. Robert Hunter, director of insurance at the group.
“In some areas, many responsible lower-income drivers are required to spend more than $1,000 a year for liability coverage that is often unfairly priced and provides no real insurance protection to them,” said Stephen Brobeck.
Around 14% of the car owners drive without insurance, according to an estimation made by the Insurance Research Council in 2007. In people with low or moderate income the rate is probably double, said J. Robert Hunter.
Car insurance premiums tend to be more expensive for poor people.
Car insurance cost represents a big part taken from the income for low-income workers, who regularly need to drive to work. As a consequence around 20% of car owners who earn $37,000 or less annually do not have car insurance, the authors say.
Generally homeowners pay less than persons who do not own their homes. People with low education, with less skilled occupations also have to pay more. For them premiums are 40% higher, according to a 2006 study cited in the report. The prices also rise when it comes to drivers with a flawed or a thin credit history, or to persons who had a coverage with lower limits on bodily injury.
The price of the insurance policy generally reflects the price of the car, but even a very used car, a jalopy can cost $700 to $1,000 per year, says the report. The median national cost is $835, but it weighs a lot for poor people.
The study also found that some insurers were charging more for policies with less coverage, which, they said, is likely to disproportionately affect lower-income households since they may be more likely to buy those policies.
“Some companies charge more for the basic limits for the state than they would for higher limits for the exact same driver. It’s like going into a store and saying, ‘I want a box of cereal,’ and the big box is much cheaper than the little box,” J. Robert Hunter said.
This kind of tendency also hurts poor people because they are more likely to buy the minimum coverage policies.
With only one exception, New Hampshire, car insurance is mandatory across the United States.
“The big problem is that mandatory coverage is so expensive, often costing over $1,000 in urban areas that it prevents them from buying a car,” said Stephen Brobeck.
The states have to ameliorate the access to low-cost car insurance, since California is the only state with a strong low-rate coverage program, the report says.
“The states are cracking down on the uninsured. If they are going to do that, they have a responsibility to ensure that lower income people can afford to drive,” said Stephen Brobeck.
The number of miles driven is considered a factor that diminishes the risk of accidents and it may reduce premiums, but it has an improper importance in the insurance industry’s classification system, says the report.
“Poor people, we know from the data, they spend a lot less on gas, which means they are driving less. So if insurers more fully reflected miles driven in pricing, it would lower the rate for poorer people,” said J. Robert Hunter.
In California, drivers who own a vehicle worth less than $20,000 and who have incomes of less than $27,000 to $55,000 (depending on family size) and who have driven at least three years with a clean record can qualify for minimal liability coverage at relatively low rates.
The annual premium for drivers in the program was $358, the report says. This also happens to be the highest premium the program charges in all of California. The average annual premium in Los Angeles was $802.
Also lowering the minimum amount of liability insurance that lower-income households are required to purchase was proposed by the authors.
J. Robert Hunter suggested to the Federal Insurance Office to collect more data regarding the car insurance cost for low-income persons.
Italian rescue teams have abandoned their search for bodies inside the wrecked cruise ship Costa Concordia after conditions underwater deteriorated.
“We have definitively stopped the underwater search inside the ship,” a spokesman for the fire brigade on Giglio island said.
Fifteen people are still missing after the ship ran aground off Italy on 13 January with the loss of 17 lives.
Work to recover the capsized vessel may take up to 10 months.
Italy’s civil protection agency, which has been overseeing rescue efforts, said it had contacted the families of the missing, and the foreign embassies involved, to explain its decision.
Emergency crews would continue to inspect the part of the ship that is above the water line and use specialist equipment to check whether there could be any corpses on the sea bed, it said.
Italian rescue teams have abandoned their search for bodies inside the wrecked cruise ship Costa Concordia after conditions underwater deteriorated
Divers have described tricky conditions inside the ship, with corridors cluttered with furniture and turbid waters.
Dives has been limited to a maximum of 50 minutes, making it difficult to penetrate far into the vessel.
Work to pump out more than 2,300 tons of fuel from the ship has been hampered by bad weather.
The operation to move the ship itself cannot safely begin until the fuel is removed.
The 114,500-ton Costa Concordia cruise ship ran aground on rocks with more than 4,200 people on board.
Costa Concordia was holed by a rock after being steered by its captain to within 150 metres (yards) of the tiny island of Giglio.
Captain Francesco Schettino is under house arrest in his home town of Meta di Sorrento, near Naples, while his actions are investigated.
Francesco Schettino is accused of multiple manslaughter, causing a shipwreck, and abandoning ship before all passengers were evacuated. He denies the allegations.
Costa Crociere, which is part of the world’s largest cruise ship operator Carnival Group, has offered uninjured passengers 11,000 euros ($14,500) each in compensation, on condition that they drop any legal action.
However, a consumer group and two US law firms are filing a class-action lawsuit in the US, demanding at least $160,000 for each passenger on the ship.
Opera singer Camilla Williams, the first black woman to appear in a leading role with a major US opera company, has died in Indiana at 92.
Camilla Williams had been suffering from cancer, according to Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, where she became the first black professor of voice.
The opera singer made her debut in May 1946 in the title role of Madam Butterfly with the New York City Opera.
Camilla Williams also became a strong advocate for civil rights.
“It’s impossible to overstate how important that was for the music scene in New York, for African-American singers, and for American singers,” Paul F. Driscoll, the editor-in-chief of Opera News, told the Washington Post.
Opera singer Camilla Williams, the first black woman to appear in a leading role with a major US opera company, has died in Indiana at 92
Camilla Williams’ debut performance came nearly nine years before Marian Anderson became the first African-American singer to appear at New York’s more prestigious Metropolitan Opera.
A New York Times review of Camilla Williams at the time, said the singer displayed “a vividness and subtlety unmatched by any other artist who has assayed the part here in many a year”.
In 1947 Camilla Williams performed the role of Mimi in Puccini’s La Boheme and in 1948 she sang the title role of Verdi’s Aida.
In 1951 Camilla Williams sang the title female role in first complete recording of Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess.
A lifetime member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Camilla Williams performed in her hometown of Danville, Virginia in 1963, to raise funds to free jailed civil rights demonstrators.
Camilla Williams also sang the national anthem before 200,000 people at the 1963 civil rights march on Washington, immediately before Martin Luther King gave his famous I Have a Dream speech.
In 1950, the opera singer married defense lawyer Charles Beavers, whose clients included civil rights leader Malcolm X.
After Charles Beavers’ death in 1970, Camilla Williams stepped away from opera in 1971 and began teaching before eventually retiring in 1997.
Her autobiography – “The Life of Camilla Williams, African American Classical Singer and Diva” – was published last year.
Dalisha Adams, a young mother from Brooklyn, has been arrested after she abandoned her two daughters aged just 3 and 5 on the street with only a few extra diapers.
Dalisha Adams, a 26-year-old security officer, was picked up by police on Sunday night after leaving her children in the cold near housing projects in Brooklyn around 3:00 p.m.
Two women came across the two girls and stayed with them until police arrived.
Though the two girls were bundled up warm wearing hooded down coats and Ugg boots, they seemed shaken up and very confused as to why they were abandoned near Bayview Housing Projects on Shore Parkway in Brooklyn, according to the New York Daily News.
The Bay View Houses are about a mile-and-a-half from the Breukelen Houses, where Dalisha Adams lives with her daughters and their 8-year-old sister, Dinasty, from another relationship, who was with relatives when the incident happened.
A neighbor of Dalisha Adams claims she often heard the mother screaming at her children.
The woman, who did not want to be identified, told the New York Daily News: “She was always yelling at the kids, <<Shut the f*** up>>.
“One day, I heard her curse out the little baby, “I’ll punch you in the f***ing face.”
The woman also said she heard more shouting on Sunday shortly before the girls were abandoned.
“A kid was crying. She was saying, <<Stop crying, shut the f*** up. I’m gonna get you out of here>>,” she said.
The two little girls aged just 3 and 5 have been abandoned by their mother on the street with only a few extra diapers
Other neighbors said the girls were always well dressed and clean but a resident of the housing project they lived at told the Daily News she would often shout and curse at them and pull on their arms.
The older daughter, who said her name was Domini, told the Daily News her younger sister was called Dioni and they lived in a blue house with flowers in front of it on 53rd street, but she did not know which borough of New York it was.
The girl also said her mother’s name was Dalisha and she drove a white car.
Five-year-old Domini told a photographer: “Mommy just left us on the sidewalk and drove away.”
The children showed no signs of physical abuse but were taken to Brookdale University Hospital for observation.
Just after 10:00 p.m. on Sunday night, police arrived at Dalisha Adams’ house and opened the door with a crow bar, but she was not at home.
Dalisha Adams was arrested after police matched the girls’ identity with photo records from Administration for Children’s Services, where the children are currently in custody.
The mother was charged with two counts of endangering the welfare of a minor, police said.
Police were alerted to the abandoned girls by an elderly couple who found them standing at a busy intersection with the diapers in their arms as cars zoomed by them.
Dalisha Adams was arrested after police matched the girls' identity with photo records from Administration for Children’s Services, where the children are currently in custody
The children’s grandmother, Bertha Davia, said it was all a misunderstanding and is asking ACS to place them in her care.
Bertha Davia, 52, told Eyewitness News that she lives in the complex next to where the children were left and the mother must have intended to leave her children in her care.
The grandmother said she is furious her daughter never told her the children were coming and only realized what had happened when she saw their picture on the news.
“She left them on the corner here. I live all the way over there. And they was roaming the hallways and all that. Why would she do that to my grandkids? For what reason?”
Although Bertha Davia is angry over the incident, she said she does not believe the two girls were abandoned on a street corner and it was just a big misunderstanding.
Michelle Davis, 43, from Brooklyn, told the Daily News: “They were wandering up and down the sidewalk for a while, just playing by themselves.
“It’s horrible. How could you leave your own children out there? They’re babies and you just leave them out there like that?”
The police said both children were in good condition after being checked over in hospital and were now in the care of the ACS, who did not immediately respond to an inquiry.
A large debate has sparked among public health advocates in US after the pharmaceutical company Gilead has applied to the FDA to market its HIV treatment medication Truvada as a HIV prevention pill.
Gilead wants to be able to market Truvada (tenofovir+emtricitabine), which is currently used as a HIV treatment, as a preventative pill to uninfected individuals, reports California Watch.
If the product will be approved, it would be the first of its kind.
The move has sparked debate among public health advocates who argue that the wide availability of the drug would discourage safe sex and would, in fact, increase the incidence of HIV.
“I believe that this could be catastrophic in terms of HIV prevention,” said Michael Weinstein, president the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, based in Los Angeles.
There are nearly 42,000 Californians living with HIV as of June 2011.
Michael Weinstein told California Watch that as an HIV treatment, he thinks Truvada is a “fabulous drug – it’s one pill once a day, and it has a low side-effect burden,” which include nausea, vomiting and weight loss.
Gilead wants to be able to market Truvada (tenofovir+emtricitabine), which is currently used as a HIV treatment, as a preventative pill to uninfected individuals
This new pharmaceutical prevention approach to HIV and AIDS is known in scientific circles as “pre-exposure prophylaxis”, or PrEP, and it involves taking the antiretroviral medications on a daily basis.
Clinical trials supported by the National Institutes of Health have shown that when taken daily, Truvada, a blue oval pill, reduced the risk for contracting HIV by between 44% among gay men in four countries and 73% by heterosexual couples in Uganda and Kenya.
Overall, these studies have generated enthusiasm among many medical researchers, reports California Watch.
Truvada is considered to be “an incredible achievement, a wonderful new tool that could be available to people who need additional protection against the acquisition of HIV”, according to Veronica Miller, executive director of The Forum for Collaborative HIV Research and a visiting professor at the UC Berkeley School of Public Health.
But Michael Weinstein said he’s not yet convinced by the research, and he wouldn’t want to see future mass marketing of the drug discourage gay men – the risk group most seriously affected by HIV, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – from using condoms based on “the false belief that they are protected by this”, when there’s a possibility that those taking the medication still could contract the disease.
Some HIV and AIDS awareness organizations say that while they wouldn’t want to see Truvada trump other forms of prevention, they are hopeful that the drug will help reach high-risk individuals.
“It comes down to choices,” said David Evans, director of research advocacy at Project Inform, a San Francisco organization focused on improving the health of people with HIV.
“For those who are high at risk, we want them to know that there is something new and a better option available to them.”
Nevertheless, David Evans said he shares some of the drug critics’ concerns. “We don’t want to see people give up safe sex practices,” he said.
The Annals of the Forum for Collaborative HIV Research noted that the drug had performed well in clinical trials; the safety risk is relatively low; and as a result, doctors can currently prescribe the drug for prevention off-label. However, those who use the drug could develop resistance to it, and if they don’t use it daily, the risk for contracting HIV increases, the forum said.
Other drug companies, including ViiV Healthcare, also are planning studies to sell similar prevention drugs, but given the number of clinical trials performed or under way on Truvada, Gilead’s product is likely to be the first to make it to market.
Gilead did not respond to requests for comment from California Watch.
European Union has decided to spend 3 million Euros to research “the potential of insects as an alternative source of protein”.
EU says that research projects will be selected during this year.
Food experts agree that insects would probably have to be disguised for European audiences, so the insect “food” could be used as an additive in burgers and other fast food.
The UN’s Food Standards Authority says of the research: “While insects have not traditionally been used for food in the UK or elsewhere in the European Union, it is estimated that about 2.5 billion people across the world have diets that routinely include insects.
“While many insects are regarded as pests, the UN’s Food and Agriculture authority is interested in promoting edible insects as a highly sustainable source of nutrition.”
Some worms contain three times as much protein as beef per ounce, while four crickets have as much calcium as a glass of milk.
Daniel Creedon, a chef who serves ants, locusts and bees in honey at the London Archipelago restaurant, said: “If insects start coming into the food chain they are probably going to have to be disguised.
“Food producers will probably get away with describing it as animal based proteins. Not many people will buy a locust burger.”
Website Treehugger said: “It is not hard to imagine the development of an insect-based food additive that enriches burger and nugget protein levels.
“Burgers with processed insect meal could be sold by chains under claims such as <<higher in protein>>, <<healthier fats>> and <<eco-burger>>.”
European Union has decided to spend 3 million Euros to research “the potential of insects as an alternative source of protein”
80% of countries on Earth already eat insects, and more than 2,000 insect species are often eaten by human beings.
Unlike conventional livestock, insects and bugs need little space and can be bred in sealed buildings under natural light where they live off waste, paper and algae.
The idea has previously been backed by the UN and EU as a way to tackle food shortages.
Some academics believe that the expense and environmental cost of raising livestock means that insect-eating will be inevitable – and it has been claimed that by the end of this decade, insect-eating will be widespread.
Prof. Marcel Dicke from Wageningen University in the Netherlands said: “The most important thing is getting people prepared, getting used to the idea. Because from 2020 onwards, there won’t be much of a choice for us.”
An estimated 2,000 insect species are consumed around the world, and people do not just eat insects, they relish them as delicacies. In Africa, caterpillars and winged termites are fried and eaten as roadside snacks (after wings, legs, and bristles are removed, of course), and often considered tastier than meat. Grasshoppers and bee larvae seasoned with soy sauce are favorites in Japan, where pricey canned insects are also available. Papua New Guinea is known for its nutty-flavored sago grubs (Rhynchophorus ferrugineus papuanus or R. bilineatus), beetle larvae that inhabit dead sago palm trees and are honored at annual festivals.
Insects often contain more protein, fat, and carbohydrates than equal amounts of beef or fish, and a higher energy value than soybeans, maize, beef, fish, lentils, or other beans. According to a 2004 United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report, caterpillars of many species are rich in potassium, calcium, magnesium, zinc, and iron, as well as B-vitamins. In some African regions, children fight malnutrition by eating flour made out of dried caterpillars. Pregnant and nursing women as well as anemic people also eat caterpillar species high in protein, calcium, and iron.
An increasing population of huge pythons, many of them pets that were turned loose by their owners when they got too big, appears to be wiping out large numbers of raccoons, opossums, bobcats and other mammals in Everglades, Florida, a study says.
The study, which was published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that sightings of medium-size mammals are down dramatically (as much as 99%, in some cases) in areas where pythons and other large, non-native constrictor snakes are known to be lurking.
Scientists fear the pythons could disrupt the food chain and upset the Everglades’ environmental balance in ways difficult to predict.
“The effects of declining mammal populations on the overall Everglades ecosystem, which extends well beyond the national park boundaries, are likely profound,” said John Willson, a research scientist at Virginia Tech University and co-author of the study.
Tens of thousands of Burmese pythons, which are native to Southeast Asia, are believed to be living in the Everglades, where they thrive in the warm, humid climate.
While many were apparently released by their owners, others may have escaped from pet shops during Hurricane Andrew in 1992 and have been reproducing ever since.
Burmese pythons can grow to be 26 feet long and more than 200 pounds, and they have been known to swallow animals as large as alligators. They and other constrictor snakes kill their prey by coiling around it and suffocating it.
The National Park Service has counted 1,825 Burmese pythons that have been caught in and around Everglades National Park since 2000. Among the largest so far was a 156-pound, 16.4-foot one captured earlier this month.
For the study, researchers drove 39,000 miles along Everglades-area roads from 2003 through 2011, counting wildlife spotted along the way and comparing the results with surveys conducted on the same routes in 1996 and 1997.
The National Park Service has counted 1,825 Burmese pythons that have been caught in and around Everglades National Park since 2000
The researchers found staggering declines in animal sightings: a drop of 99.3% among raccoons, 98.9% for opossums, 94.1% for white-tailed deer and 87.5% for bobcats. Along roads where python populations are believed to be smaller, declines were lower but still notable.
Rabbits and foxes, which were commonly spotted in 1996 and 1997, were not seen at all in the later counts. Researchers noted slight increases in coyotes, Florida panthers, rodents and other mammals, but discounted that finding because so few were spotted overall.
“The magnitude of these declines underscores the apparent incredible density of pythons in Everglades National Park,” said Michael Dorcas, a professor at Davidson College in North Carolina and lead author of the study.
Although scientists cannot definitively say the pythons are killing off the mammals, the snakes are the prime suspect. The increase in pythons coincides with the mammals’ decrease, and the decline appears to grow in magnitude with the size of the snakes’ population in an area.
A single disease appears unlikely to be the cause since several species were affected.
The report says the effect on the overall ecosystem is hard to predict. Declines among bobcats and foxes, which eat rabbits, could be linked to pythons’ feasting on rabbits. On the flip side, declines among raccoons, which eat eggs, may help some turtles, crocodiles and birds.
Scientists point with concern to what happened in Guam, where the invasive brown tree snake has killed off birds, bats and lizards that pollinated trees and flowers and dispersed seeds. That has led to declines in native trees, fish-eating birds and certain plants.
In 2010, Florida banned private ownership of Burmese pythons. Earlier this month, U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced a federal ban on the import of Burmese pythons and three other snakes.
Ken Salazar said Monday that the study shows why such restrictions were needed.
“This study paints a stark picture of the real damage that Burmese pythons are causing to native wildlife and the Florida economy,” he said.
The White House issued an angry denial following claims that First Lady Michelle Obama indulged in a $50,000 shopping spree at Agent Provocateur’s boutique in Madison Avenue in New York.
According to a report in the Daily Telegraph today, Agent Provocateur’s boutique in Madison Avenue was partially closed off for Michelle Obama.
Kristina Schake, director of communications for First Lady Michelle Obama said this morning: “This story is 100 per cent false.”
The Telegraph claimed: “Michelle Obama has risked the wrath of cash-strapped Americans by indulging in a $50,000 shopping spree at Agent Provocateur…
“Along with the Queen of Qatar, Sheikha Mozah, she closed off part of Madison Avenue to spend time in the luxury lingerie shop.”
The article also said that Michelle Obama’s alleged spree had sparked the 12% boost in sales recently released by the British label.
But while the chain’s profits are certainly on the rise, it was quick to point out that this is not thanks to Michelle Obama.
A spokesman for Agent Provocateur said: “Recent claims regarding Michelle Obama and purchases made at an Agent Provocateur boutique are incorrect.
“Agent Provocateur never discusses any of its clientele or their purchases.”
According to a report in the Daily Telegraph today, Agent Provocateur's boutique in Madison Avenue was partially closed off for Michelle Obama
Indeed, it goes without saying that Michelle Obama’s lingerie-purchasing habits are most likely not something she would be prepared to share with anyone but the President himself.
It seems Agent Provocateur is doing fine without her help though. In the last 43 weeks, the company reported trading has been up 12.5% on a like-for-like basis and 21.6% overall.
Over the Christmas period overall business also shot up more than 15%.
Agent Provocateur CEO Gary Hogarth told the Telegraph that the label had garnered several “unexpected famous names” in the U.S. as of late.
Beyonce Knowles and Christina Aguilera have been seen at its stores in recent months, presumably purchasing unmentionables which can run to as much as $1,990 for a single French lace nightie.
Michelle Obama has come under fire from critics of late, who have taken issue with her taste for expensive designer labels and lavish parties.
A new book by New York Times reporter Jodi Kantor, “The Obamas”, fuelled widespread criticism when it emerged that she had hosted a high-octane Alice in Wonderland Halloween party in 2009, a time when the country was in the midst of a recession.
The expensive wardrobe Michelle Obama packed for their $4 million Hawaii Christmas break, including a $2,000 dress and $1,000 skirt, also sparked a reaction.
One comment on the Naked DC site read: “She claims to be a champion of the poor and a fellow bargain shopper, but yet, here she is, sporting a dress that no unemployed American can afford.
“For someone who says she understands the troubles of the American people, who claims to shop at Target, she certainly fails to show it.”
Michelle Obama’s striking cobalt blue Barbara Tfank dress, worn for last week’s State of the Union address, is believed to be worth approximately $2,000.
While winning over the style set with the eye-catching look, some questioned whether her choice was appropriate, given that she was seated next to Jackie Bray, a single mother from North Carolina who put herself through community college to boost her career prospects after getting laid off from her job.
Agent Provocateur, founded by the son of fashion designer Vivienne Westwood, Joseph Corré, and his then-wife, Serena Rees, in 1994, was bought out by private equity firm 3i in 2007 for a reported $108.5 million.
With Sarah Shotton as creative director, the designs certainly are not for the faint-hearted. The current collection is inspired by her collection of vintage Playboy magazines.
The company’s expansion in the U.S. – where sales have outpaced the UK – is already underway.
According to Business Week, Agent Provocateur has annual sales of $40million, with a budgeted increase of nine per cent same-store sales this year in the U.S.
By summer, the label plans to have 11 retailers in the U.S. and is aiming to expand from 54 to 100 total stores worldwide in the next three years.
Jason Elia, a young man from Nashville, claimed his girlfriend dumped him for having cancer and then still insisted he hand over Superbowl tickets worth $8,000 he bought for her.
Now, the man whose story went viral on the Internet is facing claims from the woman in question that he made it all up.
Jason Elia told ESPN 97.5 radio in Houston that he was dumped because his girlfriend couldn’t handle the “stress” of having a partner with a chronic disease and when pushed for the ex-girlfriend’s identity, gave the Twitter handle of Sokhon Sen.
The story was quickly picked up by outlets across the country including Fox News, the blog Deadspin and the Huffington Post.
Jason Elia even launched a Twitter campaign to win the tickets, with the seats going to whoever brought him the most new followers.
However, Sokhon Sen said that her reputation has been falsely dragged through the mud by a man she only met once.
Jason Elia told national media that he was dumped because his girlfriend couldn't handle the “stress” of having a partner with cancer
Sokhon Sen says there were no Superbowl tickets and there were no demands. Most importantly, the young woman says, there was no breakup because there was never a relationship.
She doesn’t even care about the Superbowl, Sokhon Sen says.
Sokhon Sen believes Jason Elia is making the entire story up to get attention.
“I wouldn’t call Jason someone I dated. More like some creepy person now that I met once in my whole life. I have no idea what this whole Super Bowl thing is nor did I know about it,” she said.
Sokhon Sen believes Jason Elia is making the entire story up to get attention
The tale Jason Elia told was truly an outrage – one that had “the villain” adding insult to injury.
The host asks: “She broke up with you why?”
“Because I have cancer… She said it was too much stress for her to handle to have a boyfriend with a chronic disease,” Jason Elia responded.
Jason Elia said he was diagnosed with bladder cancer and given an 87% chance of survival.
Several news outlets picked up on the interview and broadcast the story far and wide. On Fox News, two legal analysts angrily decried the woman’s alleged claim to the Superbowl tickets.
When Sokhon Sen found out about the allegations that Jason Elia was making, she confronted him in a series of e-mails.
“Hey crazy, I read the story all over the Internet,” Sokhon Sen says in a terse exchange where she accuses him of lying about her and making up his story.
Jason Elia, in his replies, doesn’t deny that he made up the story and doesn’t deny that he was talking about her – he only says that he never intended to identify her on air.
Sokhon Sen believes Jason Elia, who says he is a TV writer who splits his time between Nashville, Tennessee, and Los Angeles, told the story to gain attention.
Jason Elia is running a contest from his Twitter account claiming he will give away the Superbowl tickets to whomever brings him the most Twitter followers. He currently has more than 14,000.
Sokhon Sen said she feels betrayed after being thrust into the spotlight and was unaware of the accusations Jason Elia is making.
For his part, Jason Elia is standing by his story, but he said the woman he was referring as his ex-girlfriend was not Sokhon Sen.
However, he declined to name the woman who he accused of dumping him over cancer.
A drone strike on al-Qaeda militants in southern Yemen killed at least 11 people, according to local residents and officials.
According to Reuters news agency, one tribal leader said at least four of the dead were local al-Qaeda leaders.
They were reportedly attacked by a drone in Abyan province.
Islamists began taking control of parts of Abyan last year. Security forces have tried unsuccessfully to push them out and suffered heavy losses.
The details of what happened are not clear, but some reports suggest a convoy of two cars was struck east of Lawdar city.
However, AFP news agency was told by tribal leaders that a control post and a school hosting a midnight meeting of local al-Qaeda chiefs and fighters were targeted in four overnight raids.
Regional al-Qaeda leader Abdul Monem al-Fahtani was among the dead, they said.
“We think they were carried out by American planes,” one tribal source told AFP, on condition of anonymity and without elaborating.
Researchers studying mice at the Stanford University School of Medicine in California have converted skin cells directly into cells which develop into the main components of the brain.
The experiment, which was reported in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, skipped the middle “stem cell” stage in the process.
The researchers said they were “thrilled” at the potential medical uses.
Far more tests are needed before the technique could be used on human skin.
Stem cells, which can become any other specialist type of cell from brain to bone, are thought to have huge promise in a range of treatments. Many trials are taking place, such as in stroke patients or specific forms of blindness.
One of the big questions for the field is where to get the cells from. There are ethical concerns around embryonic stem cells and patients would need to take immunosuppressant drugs as any stem cell tissue would not match their own.
An alternative method has been to take skin cells and reprogram them into “induced” stem cells. These could be made from a patient’s own cells and then turned into the cell type required, however, the process results in cancer-causing genes being activated.
The research group is looking at another option – converting a person’s own skin cells into specialist cells, without creating “induced” stem cells. It has already transformed skin cells directly into neurons.
This study created “neural precursor” cells, which can develop into three types of brain cell: neurons, astrocytes and oligodendrocytes.
These precursor cells have the advantage that, once created, they can be grown in a laboratory into very large numbers. This could be critical if the cells were to be used in any therapy.
Brain cells and skin cells contain the same genetic information, however, the genetic code is interpreted differently in each. This is controlled by “transcription factors”.
The researchers used a virus to infect skin cells with three transcription factors known to be at high levels in neural precursor cells.
After three weeks about one in 10 of the cells became neural precursor cells.
Lead researcher Prof. Marius Wernig said: “We are thrilled about the prospects for potential medical use of these cells.
“We’ve shown the cells can integrate into a mouse brain and produce a missing protein important for the conduction of electrical signal by the neurons.
“More work needs to be done to generate similar cells from human skin cells and assess their safety and efficacy.”
Dr. Deepak Srivastava, who has researched converting cells into heart muscle, said the study: “Opens the door to consider new ways to regenerate damaged neurons using cells surrounding the area of injury.”
On January 30, Erivedge (vismodegib) was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat adult patients with basal cell carcinoma, the most frequent type of skin cancer.
Erivedge (vesmodegib) was approved by FDA to treat metastatic basal cell carcinoma.
Genentech (division of Roche) developed the drug in collaboration with Curis. Erivedge will available in pharmacies within one or two weeks. The capsules have to be taken once a day and its safety in children it is unknown.
Patients with locally advanced basal cell cancer who are not candidates for surgery or radiation and patients with metastasis (cancer spread to other parts of the body) may benefit from this medicine.
Erivedge is the first FDA-approved drug for metastatic basal cell carcinoma.
This drug was approved earlier under the FDA’s priority review program for drugs that may offer major advances in treatment.
Erivedge (Vismodegib) inhibits the Hedgehog pathway in the cancer cells.
This pathway is active in most basal cell cancers and only in a few normal tissues (hair follicles).
“Our understanding of molecular pathways involved in cancer, such as the Hedgehog pathway, has enabled the development of targeted drugs for specific diseases. This approach is becoming more common and will potentially allow cancer drugs to be developed more quickly. This is important for patients who will have access to more effective therapies with potentially fewer side effects,” said Richard Pazdur, M.D., director of the Office of Hematology and Oncology Products in the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research.
A clinical study that enrolled 96 patients with locally advanced or metastatic basal cell carcinoma tested the safety and effectiveness of Erivedge.
Researchers recorded the percentage of patients who experienced complete or partial shrinkage or disappearance of the cancerous lesions. In 30% of the patients with metastatic disease a partial response was found and in 43% of the patients with locally advanced disease complete or partial responses were noted. The median progression-free survival rate for both groups was 9.5 months.
Basal cell carcinoma begins in the lower part of top layer of the skin (epidermis) on areas of skin that are exposed to ultraviolet radiation. It is mostly a slow growing and painless form of skin cancer. Most skin cancers appear in older people or in people with an weak immune systems. Every year around 1,000,000 of new cases of skin cancers (aside from melanoma) are diagnosed in U.S. and around 1,000 deaths are recorded.
Important Safety Information for Erivedge
“Erivedge can cause a baby to die before it is born (be stillborn) or cause a baby to have severe birth defects based on how the medicine interacts with the body.
• Female patients who can become pregnant should speak with their healthcare provider about the risks of Erivedge to their unborn child. Their healthcare provider should do a pregnancy test within seven days before they start taking Erivedge to find out if they are pregnant. Women should avoid pregnancy by using highly effective birth control before starting Erivedge, and continue during treatment and for seven months after their last dose. They should tell their healthcare provider right away if they have unprotected sex or think that their birth control has failed. Female patients must tell their healthcare provider right away if they become pregnant or think that they may be pregnant. Pregnant women are encouraged to participate in a program called the Erivedge pregnancy pharmacovigilance program by calling 1-888-835-2555.
• Male patients should always use a condom with a spermicide during sex with female partners while they are taking Erivedge and for two months after their last dose, even if they have had a vasectomy. Male patients should tell their healthcare provider right away if their female partner could be pregnant or thinks she is pregnant while they are taking Erivedge.
• Patients must not donate blood or blood products while they are taking Erivedge and for seven months after their last dose.
• The most common side effects of Erivedge are muscle spasms, hair loss, change in how things taste or loss of taste, weight loss, tiredness, nausea, diarrhea, decreased appetite, constipation, vomiting and joint aches. Another side effect may include missed monthly periods in females who can become pregnant.
• Patients should tell their healthcare provider if they have any side effect that bothers them or that does not go away.
• These are not all the possible side effects of Erivedge. For more information, please see the Full Prescribing Information for Erivedge, including the Boxed WARNING and Medication Guide.”
David Norris and Gary Dobson launch appeal against their convictions for the racist murder of teenager Stephen Lawrence in south-east London in 1993.
David Norris will appeal on the basis that the use in evidence of a surveillance video was unfair, his lawyer confirms.
The “Footscray” video showed David Norris and Gary Dobson using violent racist language.
Papers have also been received at the Court of Appeal from Gary Dobson’s solicitors, setting out his intention to appeal.
David Norris, 35, and Gary Dobson, 36, were sentenced to life after being found guilty by an Old Bailey jury at the beginning of January.
Gary Dobson was ordered to serve a minimum of 15 years and two months, and David Norris 14 years and three months.
David Norris and Gary Dobson launch appeal against their convictions for the racist murder of teenager Stephen Lawrence in south-east London in 1993
David Norris’ lawyer said the appeal will be based on the grounds that about two thirds of the way through the case, what had been a scientific case about forensic evidence became a case about a surveillance video made of the men.
He said was unfair, because the case was about scientific evidence and the video could not prove he was at the scene of Stephen Lawrence’s murder.
Meanwhile, the Attorney General is reviewing the minimum terms given to the pair following a request from a member of the public and is due to report back in the next few days.
Gary Dobson and David Norris were the first people convicted over the fatal attack on Stephen Lawrence by a group of white youths near a bus stop in Eltham on 22 April 1993.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy claimed that Britain is a country with “no industry” during a prime time national TV broadcast last night.
However, Nicolas Sarkozy’s claims have been ridiculed as “totally false” by his own Press.
Nicolas Sarkozy made the extraordinary outburst as he defended a VAT rise during a prime time national TV broadcast last night.
French president had just announced a 1.6% hike in VAT in a move designed to boost France’s failing economy.
When a journalist pointed out that Britain had experienced a rise in prices after increasing its VAT contributions, Nicolas Sarkozy spat out the words: “The United Kingdom has no industry anymore.”
Experts across the Channel today pointed out that industry accounts for almost 17% of GDP in Britain – compared with just over 14% in France.
It was newspaper Le Monde that branded Nicolas Sarkozy’s claim “totally false”, pointing out that “Britain is actually more industrialized than France”.
Le Monde admitted that “industrial decline is stronger in our country”, adding: “In 2007, industry accounted for 16.7% of GDP against 14.1% for France: a statistic that did not change in 2011.”
French President Nicolas Sarkozy claimed that Britain is a country with “no industry” during a prime time national TV broadcast last night
According to figures produced by INSEE, France’s national statistics and economic studies institute, industrial production in Britain is almost 5% higher than it is in France.
And separate figures from the OECD show that in 2009, Industry accounted for 19% of French Gross Value Added – a measure of the value of goods and services linked to GDP.
In 2010, in the UK the figure was 21.8%. In manufacturing alone, the UK figure stood at 11.5% compared with 10.7% in France.
Nicolas Sarkozy, who is hoping to be re-elected in the spring, is cutting an increasingly desperate figure as he fights to hold on to power.
He said he was borrowing the VAT measure from Germany, arguing that it had “helped to boost German competitiveness” and had not led to a rise in prices.
But in 2009 Nicolas Sarkozy claimed a similar VAT rise in the UK had “absolutely failed” to stimulate the economy.
The 11th-hour measures are a risky political gamble as the hugely unpopular Nicolas Sarkozy lags behind Socialist rival Francois Hollande in the polls.
Opinion polls also suggest the majority of the population is against an increase in sales tax, which will eat into their spending power.
It is not the first time Nicolas Sarkozy, who came face-to-face with Prime Minister David Cameron at an EU debt summit today, has expressed his dislike of his cross-Channel neighbors.
In October at an EU-27 summit, after criticism from UK ministers over the euro, Nicolas Sarkozy bluntly told David Cameron: “You have lost a good opportunity to shut up.”
He added: “We are sick of you criticizing us and telling us what to do. You say you hate the euro and now you want to interfere in our meetings.”
A month later, in response to a question at a press conference about whether France and Germany were trying to change the governments of Greece and Italy, Nicolas Sarkozy hit out, saying: “Perhaps the fact that you come from an island, you can’t understand the subtleties of the European construction.”
And today’s meeting – where EU leaders will sign off on a permanent rescue fund for the eurozone – could potentially herald a repeat of “Le Snub”, when the French leader refused to shake David Cameron’s hand after the Prime Minister vetoed proposed changes to the EU treaty in December.
Nicolas Sarkozy was not questioned on the latest comments by any of the carefully selected journalists assisting with the broadcast from the Elysee Palace.
Despite Nicolas Sarkozy’s previous view on such measures in the UK last night he saw the VAT rise as an essential measure to reverse his country’s fortunes, as he praised Angela Merkel for applying it.
It came as the German Chancellor offered “active support” at campaign rallies for Nicolas Sarkozy, who is widely expected to fail in his re-election bid.
A “Robin Hood” tax on financial transactions was also imposed by Nicolas Sarkozy last night – despite fierce opposition from EU leaders including Prime Minister David Cameron who described it as “utter madness”.
The 0.1% financial transaction levy will be introduced in August in France regardless of whether other European countries follow suit.
The tax is part of a package of measures set out by the president to promote growth and create jobs.
French and German proposals for the EU-wide financial transaction tax were among the reasons that British PM David Cameron vetoed EU treaty changes at a summit in Brussels in December.
The tax is intended to dissuade speculators from making very short-term investments in foreign exchange.
David Cameron argued that the so-called “Tobin Tax” – named after American economist James Tobin – would penalize the City of London, where 75% of European financial transactions take place.
Earlier this month, PM David Cameron vowed to wield a second veto in Europe if France and Germany insist on pushing ahead with the EU-wide tax.
“With tax on financial transactions, we are going to show an example,” said Nicolas Sarkozy last night, as he outlined the tough new measures in the hour-long broadcast, which was shown by eight channels.
While officially a presidential address, Nicolas Sarkozy made it clear that all of his attention is on the two-round presidential election to be held in April and May.
But he remains unpopular among voters. Not only are some 3 million people currently unemployed in France, but the country lost its triple-A credit rating from Standard and Poor’s earlier this month.
Before this happened, Nicolas Sarkozy had said that such a downgrade would hamper his election chances enormously, saying: “If we lose the triple-A, I’m dead.”
After the downgrade, Nicolas Sarkozy told aides: “For the first time in my life I am facing the end of my career.”
The decline of Nicolas Sarkozy, a right-wing conservative, is seen as Francois Hollande’s greatest asset, and last week the Socialist candidate launched an impassioned attack on “the world of finance”.
Francois Hollande, who was nominated to be the Socialist Party and Left Radical Party candidate in the 2012 French presidential election, has promised huge tax rises, some 23 billion euros in new spending by 2017, and 150,000 state-subsidized new jobs for young workers, as well as 60,000 new teaching jobs.
But Angela Merkel on Saturday pledged to support Nicolas Sarkozy on the campaign trail, because she apparently doubts Francois Hollande’s ability to solve the Eurozone sovereign debt crisis.
Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy have built up such a strong working relationship that they are referred to as “Merkozy”.
The latest opinion poll published this weekend suggested Francois Hollande would take 56% of votes in the second round of the election, with Nicolas Sarkozy on 44%.
Nicolas Sarkozy, who turned 57 on Saturday, has been involved in numerous scandals since coming to power in 2007.
Magistrates are currently looking at allegations that Nicolas Sarkozy and other senior members of the ruling UMP party received envelopes stuffed full of cash from Liliane Bettencourt, the L’Oreal heiress and France’s richest woman, in return for future tax breaks.
Nicolas Sarkozy’s third wife, the former supermodel Carla Bruni, has also been accused of enriching close friends in Paris through her charity work.
