A Chinese biotech partnership's vaccine success raises hopes for prevention of overlooked diseases, including hepatitis E which claims 70,000 lives annually
By Soo Bin Park
Image: US AID
From Nature magazine.
Batches of the world?s first vaccine against the hepatitis?E virus began rolling out of a Chinese factory last week, promising to stem a disease that every year infects about 20?million people and claims 70,000?lives. The vaccine is being hailed as a victory for an unusual public?private partnership that could set a precedent in China?s burgeoning biotechnology sector, and help to deliver other vaccines for diseases overlooked in the West.
The waterborne hepatitis?E virus mostly occurs in developing countries that have poor sanitation, and it is particularly prevalent in east and south Asia. Although most cases cause only mild illness, it can lead to acute liver failure ? the mortality rate reaches 4% in some regions and soars to 20% in women who are in the later stages of pregnancy. A severe outbreak of hepatitis?E in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region in northwest China, for example, caused almost 120,000 infections and more than 700 deaths between 1986 and 1988 (see ?Hidden epidemics?). There is no treatment, and improved sanitation has so far been the most effective way to stem the disease.
Sources: J. M. Hughes et al. Clin. Infect. Dis. 51, 328?334 (2010)/who/Promed-mail
The new vaccine, which was approved by China?s State Food and Drug Administration (SFDA) in December 2011, could transform that picture. More than a decade ago, researchers at Xiamen University in Fujian province genetically modified a strain of the bacterium Escherichia coli to produce a protein that, when injected into humans, stimulates the body?s immune system against hepatitis?E. But preclinical and clinical development began in earnest only in 2000, when the Yangshengtang Group, a company with interests in food and health care, invested 15?million renminbi (US$1.8?million in 2000) to set up a joint biotech laboratory in partnership with the university. The lab was given national status in 2006 by the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology and relaunched as the National Institute of Diagnostics and Vaccine Development in Infectious Diseases (NIDVD).
The institute aims to unite academia and industry in commercializing new vaccines, particularly for emerging infectious diseases. Yangshengtang set up a subsidiary company called Innovax to take potential vaccines through clinical trials to manufacturing. The hepatitis?E vaccine, Hecolin, is the company?s first product to reach the market, but it also has a vaccine against human papilloma virus that is currently in preclinical research. Approval for Hecolin came after a phase III clinical trial published in 2010 showed that it was highly effective in preventing infection among almost 100,000 healthy participants.
Hecolin cost about 500?million renminbi (US$80 million) to develop, much of which came from the Chinese government through the university. The vaccine will be sold to distributors in China at a cost of 110?renminbi per dose, and the company expects it to reach sales of 62?million renminbi in 2013. That is hardly a blockbuster income, but, according to Jun Zhang, deputy director of the NIDVD, the public?private development model helps to ensure that vital vaccines are developed regardless of whether they prove to be profitable for manufacturers.
Zhang hopes that the success of Hecolin will attract further investment in such schemes, and says that the Chinese government has been encouraging. ?Many people ? including representatives of multinational pharmaceutical companies, venture capitalists, Chinese local government officials and Chinese entrepreneurs ? think this is a worthy example of biotechnology investment,? he says.
MENLO PARK, Calif. ? Many people cite Albert Einstein?s aphorism ?Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.? Only a handful, however, have had the opportunity to discuss the concept with the physicist over breakfast.
One of those is Peter G. Neumann, now an 80-year-old computer scientist at SRI International, a pioneering engineering research laboratory here.
As an applied-mathematics student at Harvard, Dr. Neumann had a two-hour breakfast with Einstein on Nov. 8, 1952. What the young math student took away was a deeply held philosophy of design that has remained with him for six decades and has been his governing principle of computing and computer security.
For many of those years, Dr. Neumann (pronounced NOY-man) has remained a voice in the wilderness, tirelessly pointing out that the computer industry has a penchant for repeating the mistakes of the past. He has long been one of the nation?s leading specialists in computer security, and early on he predicted that the security flaws that have accompanied the pell-mell explosion of the computer and Internet industries would have disastrous consequences.
?His biggest contribution is to stress the ?systems? nature of the security and reliability problems,? said Steven M. Bellovin, chief technology officer of the Federal Trade Commission. ?That is, trouble occurs not because of one failure, but because of the way many different pieces interact.?
Dr. Bellovin said that it was Dr. Neumann who originally gave him the insight that ?complex systems break in complex ways? ? that the increasing complexity of modern hardware and software has made it virtually impossible to identify the flaws and vulnerabilities in computer systems and ensure that they are secure and trustworthy.
The consequence has come to pass in the form of an epidemic of computer malware and rising concerns about cyberwarfare as a threat to global security, voiced alarmingly this month by the defense secretary, Leon E. Panetta, who warned of a possible ?cyber-Pearl Harbor? attack on the United States.
It is remarkable, then, that years after most of his contemporaries have retired, Dr. Neumann is still at it and has seized the opportunity to start over and redesign computers and software from a ?clean slate.?
He is leading a team of researchers in an effort to completely rethink how to make computers and networks secure, in a five-year project financed by the Pentagon?s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or Darpa, with Robert N. Watson, a computer security researcher at Cambridge University?s Computer Laboratory.
?I?ve been tilting at the same windmills for basically 40 years,? said Dr. Neumann recently during a lunchtime interview at a Chinese restaurant near his art-filled home in Palo Alto, Calif. ?And I get the impression that most of the folks who are responsible don?t want to hear about complexity. They are interested in quick and dirty solutions.?
An Early Voice for Security
Dr. Neumann, who left Bell Labs and moved to California as a single father with three young children in 1970, has occupied the same office at SRI for four decades. Until the building was recently modified to make it earthquake-resistant, the office had attained notoriety for the towering stacks of computer science literature that filled every cranny. Legend has it that colleagues who visited the office after the 1989 earthquake were stunned to discover that while other offices were in disarray from the 7.1-magnitude quake, nothing in Dr. Neumann?s office appeared to have been disturbed.
A trim and agile man, with piercing eyes and a salt-and-pepper beard, Dr. Neumann has practiced tai chi for decades. But his passion, besides computer security, is music. He plays a variety of instruments, including bassoon, French horn, trombone and piano, and is active in a variety of musical groups. At computer security conferences it has become a tradition for Dr. Neumann to lead his colleagues in song, playing tunes from Gilbert and Sullivan and Tom Lehrer.
Until recently, security was a backwater in the world of computing. Today it is a multibillion-dollar industry, though one of dubious competence, and safeguarding the nation?s computerized critical infrastructure has taken on added urgency. President Obama cited it in the third debate of the presidential campaign, focusing on foreign policy, as something ?we need to be thinking about? as part of the nation?s military strategy.
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: October 31, 2012
An earlier version of this article misstated the name of the organization whose Risks Forum newsgroup is edited by Peter G. Neumann. It is the Association for Computing Machinery, not the Association of Computing Machinery.
The talking heads at Valve continue to downplay the importance Windows plays in the future of PC gaming, pointing instead to Linux as an alternative in progress that's gaining steam (and Steam, for that matter). Serving as the latest indication that Valve has a growing affinity for Linux, software engineer Drew Bliss talked up the open source platform during a presentation at the Ubuntu Developer Summit.
It's not clear if Bliss used these exact words or not, but according to Ubuntu Vibes, he made it known that Valve believes Linux is a "more viable" gaming platform than Windows 8, the latter of which ships with its own app store. It's a message that's starting to come through loud and clear from Valve.
Previous to this, Valve's Gabe Newell famously called Windows 8 a "catastrophe for everyone in the PC space," referring to the walled garden approach Microsoft seems to be taking with its newest OS. Not leaving anything to chance, Valve has increased its efforts on porting Steam over to Linux and has even begun accepting applications for a limited beta run.
According to Bliss, Ubuntu is the preferred platform on the open source side of the fence, both because it has a large user base with good community support, and because it has a strong company like Canonical behind it, Ubuntu Vibes says.
Lunarpages Internet Solutions, the award-winning global web hosting provider has recently partnered with premier online marketing agency Conversion Pipeline to provide their web hosting customers with best-in-class Search Engine Optimization and Pay-per-Click services.
Lunarpages mission has always been to offer the tools and support to webmasters in building, designing, and marketing their projects effortlessly and intelligently. This new partnership with Conversion Pipeline affords clients the opportunity to promote their brand and advertise their website with first-class Internet marketing expertise.
Lunarpages Marketing Manager Alfonso Fernandez explains, There are numerous Search Engine Marketing companies to choose from and many of our hosting clients arent sure who to trust. After working with Conversion Pipeline and getting to know their company, we knew we could trust them to not only provide results, but the level of service our clients expect from us. Lunarpages is excited our clients have an online marketing solution to help them promote and grow their business.
Sam Collingwood, Managing Partner at Conversion Pipeline, explains how the new offering will work. Lunarpages has been offering world-class Internet hosting solutions since 1998, and that high level of service and excellence has built an extremely loyal following of savvy, forward-looking companies. No matter what the size or industry, these companies need to advertise and promote their services online. Conversion Pipeline is offering powerful Search Engine Marketing Solutions specifically designed for Lunarpages clients that drive targeted search engine traffic to their website, ultimately converting more web visitors into customers.
This is not a Do It Yourself program offered by most other web hosting providers. These online marketing campaigns include SEO and PPC packages, both of which are fully managed solutions that give Lunarpages clients peace of mind knowing their business is being promoted and advertised 24/7. The SEO program includes writing and promoting original content, building quality backlinks, and the ability for customers to track their success through monthly reports and access to customer analytics portal. The PPC Program is not Set it and forget it. Conversion Pipeline provides continual bid management analysis, keyword analysis and A/B split testing.
Lunarpages is excited to partner with Conversion Pipeline, and confident that adding the professional online marketing agency to their client offerings is just another reason why so many companies choose Lunarpages for their Internet solutions.
About Lunarpages Internet Solutions
Lunarpages is a leading provider of managed hosting services with over 150,000 customers, providing secure, reliable and compliant IT infrastructure and management for some of the worlds most demanding enterprises. Founded in 1998, Lunarpages is a growing, profitable business run by a seasoned management team with experience in delivering hosting solutions including colocation, managed services and cloud hosting services. Lunarpages suite of services are designed for organizations seeking scalable, secure, robust and enterprise-grade hosting solutions that can be quickly provisioned or tailored to meet unique requirements. Backed by its commitment to deliver a customer first solution, Lunarpages continues to innovate and lead the industry with products and services that improve business practices and produce greater profits for our customers.
Contact Lunarpages at 1.877.586.2772, or visit http://www.lunarpages.com for more information.
About Conversion Pipeline
Conversion Pipeline is a leading Internet marketing company helping businesses advertise online and increase their search engine rankings in Google, Yahoo! and Bing. Through Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Social Media Marketing, Pay-Per-Click (PPC) and Reputation Management solutions we are able to elevate brand awareness, increase conversion ratios and drive new revenue growth for our clients.
For more information please visit http://www.conversionpipeline.com or contact the Pipeline creative team at info(at)conversionpipeline(dot)com.
Having a relationship with a patient is a difficult issue for medical professionals. In many cases, the patient will consent or even seek out a relationship with the medical professional. However, the American Medical Association frowns upon such relationships, as the professional relationship will often include large quantities of private information and potential vulnerability to the doctor. As such, whether the patient can truly consent to the relationship is arguable in some situations. Terminating the professional relationship before entering into a personal relationship may satisfy state ethical rules.
Whether the relationship constitutes a breach of professional ethics is one matter; whether it constitutes malpractice is another. Medical boards will address the ethical considerations, while courts address the legal considerations. In the case of a relationship, reminds our medical malpractice attorney in Syracuse, the doctor?s actions must be related to the treatment to be considered a breach of a duty.
Malpractice and Relationships
Medical legal trouble occurs when a medical professional is negligent in his or her duties. As with any negligence case, the plaintiff must prove duty, breach, causation, and injury. Medical professionals have a duty to provide services in accordance with the standards set forth in the medical community. A breach of that duty occurs where an act or omission fails to live up to those standards, causing an injury. Each element will be contested in most trials for this type of malpractice; in a medical malpractice suit stemming from a failed personal relationship, the elements of duty and breach will be the most heavily contested.
Personal relationships can often involve both personal and professional elements. In a personal relationship, one partner can give the other advice regarding treatment for minor ailments without involving another medical professional. By merely speaking with one another, the doctor arguably may be providing mental health counseling. By providing medical services, the doctor may be assuming a duty of care. Such was the argument that the defendant?s attorney made in front of an appellate panel in the New York case.
In some cases, such arguments will be tenuous. In the New York case, the patient was being treated for panic attacks, depression, and an unspecified gastrointestinal issue. Arguments that the doctor was providing mental health services hold more merit when mental health is a component of the treatment regimen. The conduct must be related to the treatment to constitute medical malpractice. A jury could view the situation as being related, as being unrelated, or as being partially related to the treatment.
If the jury finds that the doctor was even partially negligent, comparative negligence statutes permit plaintiffs to recover for at least some of the damages. Patients concerned about being manipulated, harassed, or otherwise mistreated while in a relationship with their doctor should consider contacting an attorney experienced in the physician litigation field.
A former TV journalist, Ann Bailey submits this research for the benefit of New York patients who feel they may have been victims of medical errors.? The medical malpractice attorney in Syracuse, Bottar Leone PLLC, represents all manner of consultation, litigation and settlement for victims of suspected abuse of this nature in the State of New York.
Filmmaker Ken Burns and the Connecticut-based,?luxury travel company, Tauck, are planning an 8-day New England tour package that will include an overnight stay and feature homes of Mark Twain and Harriet Beecher Stowe.
When it officially begins operating next spring, Tauck?s ?Hidden Gems of New England? tour will mark the first time the 87-year-old company has hosted guests for an overnight stay in Connecticut.?? The tour will operate with departures from June through October, and Tauck president Jennifer Tombaugh said the company expects to bring several hundred travelers into the greater Hartford area in each of the coming years.
The redesigned Tauck tour will have the company?s guests arrive at Bradley International Airport and then begin their 8-day itinerary with an overnight at the Hartford Marriott Downtown.? During their first day in Hartford, Tauck guests will enjoy a catered dinner at the Mark Twain Museum and a private, after-hours tour of the Mark Twain House.? The following morning, guests will travel to the Harriet Beecher Stowe House for a guided visit.
For his part, filmmaker Burns was particularly pleased about the cultural implications of Tauck?s decision to include Hartford in its tour.? ?My mission in making films has always been to explore who we are as Americans,? said Burns.? ?Mark Twain and Harriet Beecher Stowe had a similar goal, at a time when the experience and definition of ?being an American? was entirely dictated by the color of one?s skin.? These two remarkable individuals asked difficult questions of their country, and we became a better place for it.? I?m thrilled that Tauck is helping to keep the legacies of Mark Twain and Harriet Beecher Stowe alive.?
Besides showcasing some of the Hartford area?s top tourism sites, Tauck?s ?Hidden Gems of New England? also travels into Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont before concluding in Boston.? Along the way, Tauck guests visit other iconic New England locations such as Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, and they also gain special ?insider access? to places and experiences they?d either be unaware of or not have access to on their own.
For example, at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, Tauck guests will gain perspectives on New England culture from Jere Daniell, who taught history at the college for 40 years.? In Boston, Tauck will provide its guests with an insider?s tour of famed Fenway Park.? And in tiny Walpole, New Hampshire, an exclusive visit to the studio of Ken Burns will provide insights into the filmmaker?s amazing career.? Tauck will operate departures of ?Hidden Gems of New England? from June into October, with prices for the all-inclusive journey priced from $2,990 per person, double occupancy, plus airfare.
About Tauck.? Tauck is a world leader in upscale guided travel, with nearly 100 land and cruise itineraries to some 70 countries and all seven continents.? The company has been named to Travel + Leisure magazine?s list of the ?World?s Best Tour Operators & Safari Outfitters? in each of the past 15 years, and it has also been named to the magazine?s list of the ?World?s Best River Cruise Lines? in each of the past four years.
About ?Ken Burns American Journeys.?? Through its ?Ken Burns American Journeys? partnership, Tauck is working with the award-winning filmmaker and his long-time collaborator Dayton Duncan to craft travel experiences that incorporate the themes of Burns?s films, including (among others) ?The National Parks: America?s Best Idea,? ?The Civil War,? ?Mark Twain? and ?Jazz.?
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SDSU researchers to study China's national treasurePublic release date: 25-Oct-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Natalia Van Stralen Natalia.vanstralen@sdsu.edu 619-594-2585 San Diego State University
San Diego State University researchers will lead a study of one of China's national treasures and endangered species: The Guizhou snub-nosed monkey, often called the golden monkey.
As part of a $1.3 million grant from the National Science Foundation, student researchers from SDSU's departments of geography, biology and educational technology will travel this month to the Fanjingshan National Nature Reserve, home to the monkey known for its golden fur, to examine the effect of payments for ecosystem services.
SDSU researchers and colleagues from the University of North Carolina will study the practice of offering incentives to landholders in exchange for managing and maintaining their land and the effect it has on the conservation efforts of the golden monkey reserve.
Payments for ecosystem services have been in practice for several decades, but little is known about what environmental and socio-demographic changes they may have initiated and whether such changes will be sustainable in the future.
A passion for protecting
Li An, SDSU geography professor and the project's principal investigator, is a Chinese native and has long been intrigued with his country's endangered species.
This will be one of his many ventures into the Fanjingshan reserve to study these mysterious creatures, their habitat and the local indigenous people.
"In China, the endangered golden monkey is a symbol for conservation and the environment," An said. "If we learn more about the effectiveness of ecosystem payments, we can better understand what it takes to sustain environments, local people's livelihoods and endangered species such as these."
The project will use several components, including satellite imagery and cameras, to monitor the monkeys' movements and interactions. Interviews and surveys of local Chinese people will help the researchers understand the community's interactions with the monkeys.
Professors and students from SDSU and UNC will work alongside students from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Guizhou University in China to collect data at the reserve.
The program will also build on An's previous research at the Wolong Nature Reserve for giant pandas, which linked the effects of human socioeconomic and lifestyle dynamics to changes in the pandas' habitat, and developed a model of action to protect their environment.
An hopes to discover parallels in his research that will help plan, design and implement improved payment for ecosystems programs worldwide.
The big picture
A research component, led by Minjuan Wang, professor of educational technology at SDSU, will engage three schools from San Diego and China to create effective education programs for K-12 students, their teachers and junior scholars based on active learning activities related to ecosystems.
Wang will conduct workshops for teachers and help them develop new science and geography curriculum. Selected participants from Helix High and Clover Flat schools in San Diego and Jiangkou Elementary school in China will participate in the workshops.
In addition, scientists will produce and post a completed video and other research online for free use by teachers and students around the world.
###
Other SDSU team members of the project include:
Stuart Aitken, department chair and professor of geography
Douglas Stow, doctoral program advisor and professor of geography
Rebecca Lewison, professor of biology
Grant details
Sustainability of Payments for Ecosystem Services in Coupled Natural and Human Systems was funded for four years starting Aug. 15.
About San Diego State University
San Diego State University is the oldest and largest higher education institution in the San Diego region. Since it was founded in 1897, the university has grown to offer bachelor's degrees in 89 areas, master's degrees in 78 areas and doctorates in 21 areas (Ph.D., Ed.D., Au.D., and DPT). SDSU's approximately 31,000 students participate in an academic curriculum distinguished by direct contact with faculty and an increasing international emphasis that prepares them for a global future. For more information, visit www.sdsu.edu.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
SDSU researchers to study China's national treasurePublic release date: 25-Oct-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Natalia Van Stralen Natalia.vanstralen@sdsu.edu 619-594-2585 San Diego State University
San Diego State University researchers will lead a study of one of China's national treasures and endangered species: The Guizhou snub-nosed monkey, often called the golden monkey.
As part of a $1.3 million grant from the National Science Foundation, student researchers from SDSU's departments of geography, biology and educational technology will travel this month to the Fanjingshan National Nature Reserve, home to the monkey known for its golden fur, to examine the effect of payments for ecosystem services.
SDSU researchers and colleagues from the University of North Carolina will study the practice of offering incentives to landholders in exchange for managing and maintaining their land and the effect it has on the conservation efforts of the golden monkey reserve.
Payments for ecosystem services have been in practice for several decades, but little is known about what environmental and socio-demographic changes they may have initiated and whether such changes will be sustainable in the future.
A passion for protecting
Li An, SDSU geography professor and the project's principal investigator, is a Chinese native and has long been intrigued with his country's endangered species.
This will be one of his many ventures into the Fanjingshan reserve to study these mysterious creatures, their habitat and the local indigenous people.
"In China, the endangered golden monkey is a symbol for conservation and the environment," An said. "If we learn more about the effectiveness of ecosystem payments, we can better understand what it takes to sustain environments, local people's livelihoods and endangered species such as these."
The project will use several components, including satellite imagery and cameras, to monitor the monkeys' movements and interactions. Interviews and surveys of local Chinese people will help the researchers understand the community's interactions with the monkeys.
Professors and students from SDSU and UNC will work alongside students from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Guizhou University in China to collect data at the reserve.
The program will also build on An's previous research at the Wolong Nature Reserve for giant pandas, which linked the effects of human socioeconomic and lifestyle dynamics to changes in the pandas' habitat, and developed a model of action to protect their environment.
An hopes to discover parallels in his research that will help plan, design and implement improved payment for ecosystems programs worldwide.
The big picture
A research component, led by Minjuan Wang, professor of educational technology at SDSU, will engage three schools from San Diego and China to create effective education programs for K-12 students, their teachers and junior scholars based on active learning activities related to ecosystems.
Wang will conduct workshops for teachers and help them develop new science and geography curriculum. Selected participants from Helix High and Clover Flat schools in San Diego and Jiangkou Elementary school in China will participate in the workshops.
In addition, scientists will produce and post a completed video and other research online for free use by teachers and students around the world.
###
Other SDSU team members of the project include:
Stuart Aitken, department chair and professor of geography
Douglas Stow, doctoral program advisor and professor of geography
Rebecca Lewison, professor of biology
Grant details
Sustainability of Payments for Ecosystem Services in Coupled Natural and Human Systems was funded for four years starting Aug. 15.
About San Diego State University
San Diego State University is the oldest and largest higher education institution in the San Diego region. Since it was founded in 1897, the university has grown to offer bachelor's degrees in 89 areas, master's degrees in 78 areas and doctorates in 21 areas (Ph.D., Ed.D., Au.D., and DPT). SDSU's approximately 31,000 students participate in an academic curriculum distinguished by direct contact with faculty and an increasing international emphasis that prepares them for a global future. For more information, visit www.sdsu.edu.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Renewable energy is the future, say environmentalists. But for green and ethical investors it has turned into a nightmare, with makers of wind and solar power systems among the worst-performing stocks in recent years.
Take Vestas, the Danish wind turbine maker. Early investors enjoyed sparkling returns, with shares leaping from 34 Danish kroner in 2003 to 698 in 2008 ? a 20-fold rise. But since then, beset by the loss of government subsidies, cost overruns, production delays and competition from China, the price has collapsed. Today it is trading at 35 kroner ? so someone investing in 2008 will have lost nearly 95% of their money.
In August Vestas revealed it had slumped into losses and shed another 1,400 jobs, bringing total redundancies for the year to more than 3,700. It had planned to construct a plant at Sheerness docks in Kent to supply turbines for expected deep-water North Sea windfarms, but this was axed in June.
Solar panel manufacturers have also burnt a hole in investors' pockets. Look at SunTech, the world's biggest maker of PV (photovoltaic) panels, based in Wuxi, China. Its private equity backers (notably Goldman Sachs) made a fortune when it listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2005, making well over 10 times their original investment. So did the people who bought at the initial share launch, with the shares shooting from $20 to $79 in late 2007. And today? They are changing hands at just 92 cents. First Solar, another one-time darling of Nasdaq, collapsed from $308 in April 2008 to $23 last week. Solar is an industry awash with overcapacity in China, falling prices and declining government subsidies.
Funds that specialise in renewable energy have fallen a long way short of expectations. Impax Environmental, an investment trust, has lost 20% over the past five years, while BlackRock New Energy investment trust has done even worse, falling 49.9% since 2007. It's a salutary reminder to avoid investment fads and bubbles.
Meanwhile, many "sin" stocks screened out by ethical investors have outperformed. At the turn of the century, in the midst of the "TMT" (technology, media and telecoms) stock market bubble, tobacco companies were the market's most unloved sector. Shares in British American Tobacco, makers of Dunhill, Kent, Lucky Strike and Pall Mall, were changing hands at 224p. Today they fetch ?31.93.
LONDON (Reuters) - Children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) who take stimulants such as Ritalin tend to feel the drugs help them control their behavior and do not turn them into "robots" as many skeptics assume, a study found on Monday.
The research, which for the first time asked children taking ADHD drugs what they felt about their treatment and its effects, found that many said medication helped them manage their impulsivity and make better decisions.
"With medication, it's not that you're a different person. You're still the same person, but you just act a little better," said Angie, an 11-year-old from the United States who took part in the study and was quoted in a report about its findings.
The results are likely to further fuel the debate in the United States and Europe about whether children with ADHD, some as young as four years old, should be given stimulants.
ADHD is one of the most common childhood disorders in the United States, where an average 9 percent of children between the ages of five and 17 are diagnosed with it each year. In Britain experts estimate that between 5 and 10 percent of children and adolescents have ADHD.
Symptoms of the disorder include difficulty staying focused, hyperactivity and problems with controlling disruptive or aggressive behavior.
"ADHD is a very emotive subject which inspires passionate debate," said Ilina Singh, a biomedical ethicist from King's College London who led the research.
"Everyone seems to have an opinion about the condition, what causes it, how to deal with children with ADHD, but the voices of these children are rarely listened to."
"Who better to tell us what ADHD is like and how medication affects them than the children themselves?"
Singh's study, which was funded by medical charity the Wellcome Trust, involved interviewing children from 151 families in Britain and the United States to examine some of the ethical and societal issues surrounding ADHD - in particular the use of drug treatments such as Ritalin.
"DRUGGED INTO ACQUIESCENCE"
Ritalin, known generically as methylphenidate, is sold by the Swiss drugmaker Novartis and is widely used in developed countries to help children with ADHD concentrate better and control impulsivity.
Without effective treatment, children with ADHD can be disruptive at school and fall behind, and adolescents may engage in impulsive, risky behavior.
Singh, who presented her findings in a report called "Voices" at a briefing in London, pointed to disputes surrounding prescribing stimulant drugs for children with ADHD.
Some critics argue the medications "turn children into robots", she said, or say that ADHD sufferers are being "drugged into acquiescence".
But according to the results of the study, such concerns are largely unfounded, Singh said.
"The assumed ethical harms of stimulant medications were largely not supported by this study," she said. "Children value medication because it puts them into a space where they can make good moral decisions."
Singh added that the study's findings were "in no way a blanket endorsement of the use of stimulant-based medicines" for ADHD, but stressed they also showed that assumptions about what ADHD drugs did appeared to be "hurting children more than the drugs".
Singh said all the medicated children in the study were taking either Novartis' Ritalin, or Concerta, a longer-acting version of the same drug made by Johnson & Johnson.
Other common drugs used to treat ADHD include Shire's Adderall and Vyvanse, and Eli Lilly's Strattera.
(Reporting by Kate Kelland; Editing by Pravin Char)
LIPA CITY - Not far from the world of regimented cubicles and headset-toting call center operators, a quiet revolution is stirring in its slippers.
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University librarian Sheila Ortencio, for example, was so poorly paid that half her salary went for childcare, and her meals amounted to dried fish and one fried egg per day. Four years on, she juggles two daughters, a husband and two Pomeranians as she catalogues ebooks online from her parents' couch.
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In her freelancing job, she's earned enough money to buy land for a house nearby and make down payments on a condo in the capital.
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"I have double the work but, it doesn't bother me because it doesn't feel like work," she says.
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Ortencio is one of more than half a million Filipinos registered on freelance website oDesk.com - more than are currently employed by the country's growing business process outsourcing (BPO) industry.
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While it's early days, proponents of so-called commercial crowdsourcing contend that a swelling army of global freelancers is already disrupting traditional outsourcing - from preparing tax statements to conducting research on pediatricians.
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"This is all about cost arbitration across borders," says Siou Chew Kuek, a Singaporean researcher who works with the World Bank. "Now you can farm out your work to anyone in the world."
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LOW-HANGING FRUIT
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Driving this trend are a dozen mostly U.S. startups that let other small and medium-sized companies carve projects into chunks and then recruit individuals or teams of freelancers to do the work. By leveraging a faster, more ubiquitous and cheaper Internet, the startups can pluck the low-hanging fruit of IT and data-entry outsourcing that big BPO players such as Infosys and Wipro once considered their own.
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Australian-U.S. startup 99designs, for example, has paid out $40 million to some 180,000 graphic designers, with its largest user base outside the United States being in Indonesia. Elance has 266,000 freelancers in India who have earned nearly $150 million. Odesk has 2.4 million registered freelancers and more than 480,000 clients - companies including Cisco and HP.
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"This is moving the entire BPO industry - that was dominated by these large middlemen organisations that take most of the profits - to the cloud," says Anand Kulkarni, an academic-turned-entrepreneur. "Now you no longer need to be able to afford Infosys rates to be able to get quality results out of an outsourcing system."
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For sure, the BPO industry is not necessarily quaking in its boots. The industry was worth $150 billion last year and is growing at 5-6 percent a year, according to Pradeep Mukherji, an Indian IT consultant and adviser to the World Bank.
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Crowdsourcing companies admit it's still an uphill struggle to persuade firms to experiment with outsourcing work to freelancers rather than keeping it in-house or sticking with established BPO players.
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For freelancers, many face a precarious career: not always getting paid for work completed, going without healthcare insurance, and job opportunities not always being available. Indeed, many freelancers who have signed up with oDesk have never received feedback from clients - suggesting they have either not tried to pitch for work or haven't won any yet.
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"It's true to say that it's hard to get that first contract," says Panos Ipeirotis, an associate professor at New York University who studies oDesk data.
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SECOND WAVE OF INNOVATION
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Such imbalances are feeding a second wave of innovation in the industry. The first outsourcers focused on what oDesk.com CEO Gary Swart calls the eBay model ? using recommendations, feedback and trust to create a market where companies find good freelancers and freelancers can build a reputation.
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But as freelancers build closer relationships with clients, both sides prefer a more structured model where trusted freelancers hire their own team, prompting oDesk and others to tweak their software to accommodate them. Ortencio, for example, manages several other oDeskers on behalf of long-term clients.
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In the past couple of years, other startups have tried to mend weak links in the chain. A potential employer posting a project on Elance or oDesk, for example, can be overwhelmed by applicants - making it difficult for them to find the best freelancers quickly, and harder for freelancers to stand out from the crowd.
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Kulkarni hopes to solve this problem by having his startup MobileWorks train workers to guarantee quality, and by breaking down projects into micro-tasks to lift less-skilled workers onto their first rung. Tasks range from transcribing hedge fund forms to generating sales leads.
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Once they're proficient at micro-tasks, Kulkarni says, "they would be let loose on sites like oDesk or Freelancer.com" where they can earn higher fees.
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Ortencio similarly multiplied her pay. She started out charging $1.50 an hour - the same she was earning as a librarian ? but is now billing $8.50. Her experience is far from unique: The average contractor on oDesk, the company says, has seen monthly income grow 190 percent after three years.
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Nearly all crowdsourcing companies make their money by charging a fee to contractors for each successful transaction. All declined to share detailed earnings, but oDesk, which claims to be the biggest online workplace, said that its contractors earned about $75 million in the first quarter of 2012, against $40 million a year ago.
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"MICRO-ENTREPRENEURS"
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While crowdsourcing is global - Elance boasts clients in 180 countries and freelancers in 155 - much of the growth is coming from Asia. Indonesians, for example, flock to 99designs.com, where instead of up-front contracts they submit graphic designs in the hope of winning a prize.
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Recently dozens gathered in the Javanese city of Yogyakarta to thank 99designs in a video. The first the company's Australian president and CEO, Patrick Llewellyn, heard about it was when it was posted online. "I was moved to tears," he said.
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Such growth is prompting crowdsourcing companies to set up operations nearer to where the action is. Taskus, a boutique outsourcing company, and Freelancer.com, for example, have both based their Asian operations in the Philippines.
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Some are going further afield. On a trip to Nepal, Canadian Mark Sears saw so many engineers and MBAs sitting idle that he saw a business opportunity and moved his family to Kathmandu. Now CloudFactory trains teams to complete micro-tasks on behalf of clients back home, like annotating videos of amateur hockey games. His latest recruit: Mohamud Juman, an English-speaking Facebook addict who collects trash outside their office.
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Indeed, companies like CloudFactory and MobileWorks say they are out not only to turn a profit but also to battle poverty. World Bank adviser Mukherji says this so-called "impact sourcing" already employs 560,000 workers and could account for nearly a quarter of the total BPO workforce by the end of the decade.
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Governments and organizations such as the World Bank are taking note of the potential for an industry that generates foreign exchange but requires very little capital outlay. Bangladesh was one of the first countries to declare online earnings tax-free, for example, and MobileWorks has recently signed an agreement with the government of Jamaica to deploy the service on a national scale.
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All companies stress they're out to make money by mobilizing what Ajay Vinze, of the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University, calls a movement of "micro-entrepreneurs."
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Sheila Ortencio puts it more simply: "We want to be an independent, modern Filipino family." ? Reuters
Men's Health is the most popular magazine for reading about the latest health and lifestyle trends. With good resource you can find articles on everything male related. From how to get that six pack you always wanted, to grooming and bedroom advice, Mens Health is a modern favorite and respected source for fitness related articles. Having this magazine around will not only entertain you, but show that woman in your life that you care about your health.
Cancer. A study released in 2009 revealed that men are more likely to develop and die from cancer. And the difference is not biological, but behavioral, based on 2009 research by the National Cancer Intelligence Network: men are less health conscious, more reluctant to visit a doctor when symptoms arise, and less likely to make lifestyle changes. At least one third of all cancers can be prevented through lifestyle changes, according to the World Health Organization: avoiding tobacco, eating healthy, staying active and losing weight.
In fact, surveys across the world show that there is a huge upsurge of sexual deformity detected in men in the recent years. Starting from a small penis to an inevitable erectile dysfunction, sexual diseases are at large tolling high on the male health. The surveys reveal that more than 30 million men in United States are suffering from some or the other sexual deformity. A deformity in the primal sexual organ in men, carrying the sperm, is one of the major causes of the frequent sexual disorders.
Other supplements may include: Arginine, Prostate support, Zinc, Co-Q-10, multi-mineral, Vitamin D, homeopathic and herbal remedies for male health, omega-3s and green tea.
The people who used of use the ED drug of Viagra, they have to have rich ones. Otherwise $15.00 is not a little amount that you can spend only for the sexual enjoyment for a single time. After the deletion of patent protection on useful resource is open to all for making the medicine with this. Some of the brands that are producing the medicine with Sildenafil citrate are Silagra, Kamagra, and Forzest etc. You may think that this is a generic Viagra and will not act on ED so properly as Viagra works. But, it is informed them that the main ingredient is the same, the dose and power and all the timing of taking medicine will remain the same.
There are some excellent supplements that can be taken for prostate health, and a good diet rich in fruits and vegetables, and low in red meats and other heavy, hard to digest meats, has been linked to the maintenance of prostate health and prevention of prostate cancer as well.
So much of the youth-preservation and anti-aging industry here in America used to be focused exclusively on women, who were thought to be the only sex of the human species to be interested in preserving their youth, extending health and life, and enhancing their physical beauty for longer periods of time.
The first few months of a newborn?s life are critical in terms of language acquisition and cognitive development. However, this time period is very sensitive and complex, and various environmental factors can have an impact on a child?s early development.
Now, a new study has revealed that both maternal depression and a common kind of antidepressant are two big environmental issues, which can alter when this learning phase begins in children ? ultimately affecting their ability to learn how to speak.
Researcher from the University of British Columbia, Harvard University and the Child & Family Research Institute have revealed that treating maternal depression with a class of antidepressants called serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SRIs) help to speed up the newborn?s ability to grasp and understand the sights and sounds of their native language. Conversely, untreated maternal depression ultimately delayed this period of language acquisition.
According to the scientists, this phase of cognitive development begins before a baby is even born ? meaning their prenatal environment is extremely important.
?My work and the work of a lot of other people have shown that we develop in the womb ready to learn any of the world?s languages,? Janet Werker, a professor in the department of psychology at the University of British Columbia and the study?s lead author, told FoxNews.com. ?We start out universal listeners, ready to learn what languages we hear and see.?
Werker explained that during this language learning period, newborns are able to differentiate between the characteristics of their native language and the characteristics of languages of foreign speakers. This window of learning eventually closes though, typically around 8 months after birth.
Once the window closes, babies stop paying attention to sounds they do not need and lose the ability to discern between verbal cues that are not utilized in their native language.
?For example, when it comes to the difference between [the words] ?raw? and ?law,? you as an English speaker can hear that distinction,? Werker said, ?but a Japanese adult cannot.
We value and respect the experiences of all of our HERWriters, but everyone is different. Many of our writers are speaking from personal experience, and what's worked for them may not work for you. Their articles are not a substitute for medical advice although we hope you can gain knowledge from their insight.
Lab experiments show how certain types of stones can morph into magnets
Web edition : Friday, October 12, 2012
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Lodestone is the most common type of natural magnet.
Wikimedia/Ryan Somma
Heat up a rock. Most likely, all you will get is a hot rock. But heat up the right type of stone to just the right temperature and you could end up with a magnet, scientists now report.
Visit the new?Science News for Kids?website?and read the full story:?Making rocks into magnets
JERUSALEM (AP) ? A leading Jewish organization is calling on the White House to cut contacts with Egypt's most powerful political movement, the Muslim Brotherhood, over anti-Semitic remarks attributed to its spiritual guide.
Mohammed Badie said that Jews were spreading "corruption," had slaughtered Muslims and profaned holy sites, according to comments published on the group's website and emailed to reporters. He further called on Muslims to fight Israel, saying Zionists only understood force.
Egypt's President Mohammed Morsi, who was elected this summer in the aftermath of the country's 2011 popular uprising, hails from the Brotherhood.
In a statement Friday, the Simon Wiesenthal center said the U.S. could not pretend to conduct "business as usual" when the group made such statements.
(This film image released by Warner Bros. Pictures shows Ben Affleck as Tony Mendez, center, in "Argo," a rescue thriller about the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis. "Argo" opens this weekend. The Salt Lake Tribune) 's Sean Means calls the movie "an exciting thriller that melds spy intrigue with human-scaled drama and Hollywood-industry comedy." (AP Photo/Warner Bros., Claire Folger)
Review ? Thriller recounts daring CIA rescue mission.
"Argo" is a marvelously exciting movie, a riveting thriller pulled from a real-life incident in which two of the most distrusted entities in American life ? the Central Intelligence Agency and Hollywood ? were the unmistakable good guys.
Director Ben Affleck ? and who could have guessed that name and job title would fit so well together? ? and screenwriter Chris Terrio weave together spy intrigue, political double talk, an international crisis and movie-industry self-deprecation into a story that?s so fantastic that it had to be true.
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?Argo?
A CIA agent forms an outlandish plan to save six Americans during the Iranian hostage crisis in this tension-filled true-life drama.
Where ? Theaters everywhere.
When ? Opens Friday, Oct. 12.
Rating ? R for language and some violent images.
Running time ? 120 minutes.
It?s 1979, after the revolution that deposed the Shah of Iran and put the Ayatollah Khomeini in power. When the Shah is allowed medical exile in the United States, Iranian rebels retaliate by overrunning the U.S. Embassy, taking 52 Americans hostage for 444 days ? a crisis whose resolution came in the final minutes of Jimmy Carter?s presidency. When the rebels invaded, though, six U.S. Embassy workers sneaked out a back way and were given refuge by the Canadian ambassador, Ken Taylor (Victor Garber).
In early 1980, after a couple of months of the embassy "houseguests" hiding out, and with U.S. officials believing the Ayatollah?s regime will figure out there are Americans unaccounted for, the State Department tries to devise an escape plan. To CIA agent Tony Mendez (played by Affleck), an expert at such missions, the State Department?s solutions are unworkable and will likely get six Americans killed. Mendez hits upon an audacious idea: He will go undercover as a Hollywood producer making a movie in Iran and claim that the six embassy workers are his film crew.
It?s a long shot, but "this is the best bad idea we?ve got, by far," Mendez?s boss (Bryan Cranston) tells the State Department honchos.
Mendez enlists John Chambers (John Goodman), the Hollywood makeup effects artist who worked on "Planet of the Apes," and together they recruit a producer (Alan Arkin) to find a script ? a cheesy sci-fi adventure called "Argo" ? and to set up a dummy production company to look convincing. Mendez then flies into Tehran to give the embassy workers their cover stories, which they must memorize and recite well enough to convince Iran?s Revolutionary Guard.
Terrio?s script and Affleck?s direction combine these disparate settings ? the glamour of a phony Hollywood party and the chaos of battle-torn Tehran ? with an attention for detail that makes both worlds authentic and alive. This is especially evident in a powerful moment where a script reading of the sci-fi film is intercut with propaganda speechmaking by the Iranian hostage-takers.
Affleck?s previous movies as director, the Boston-based crime dramas "Gone Baby Gone" and "The Town," drew favorable comparisons to Sidney Lumet?s best work ? and "Argo" also shows that Lumet touch for combining political importance and white-knuckle tension. Affleck also shows a sure hand with complex storytelling, neatly weaving the CIA office dynamics with the emotional stresses of the embassy "houseguests." And, just to show how good a director he is, he gets a soulful, stirring performance from none other than Ben Affleck.
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PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - One of the Taliban's most feared commanders, Maulana Fazlullah, carefully briefed two killers from his special hit squad on their next target.
The gunmen weren't going after any army officer, politician or Western diplomat. Their target was a 14-year-old Pakistani schoolgirl who had angered the Taliban by speaking out for "Western"-style girls' education.
Tuesday's shooting of Malala Yousufzai was the culmination of years of campaigning that had pitted the fearless, smiling young girl against one of Pakistan's most ruthless Taliban commanders.
Their story began in 2009, when Fazlullah, known as Radio Mullah for his fiery radio broadcasts, took over Swat Valley, and ordered the closure of girls' schools, including Yousufzai's.
Outraged, the then-11-year-old kept a blog for the BBC under a pen name and later launched a campaign for girls' education. It won her Pakistan's highest civilian honor and death threats from the Taliban.
Yousufzai was not blind to the dangers. In her hometown of Mingora, Fazlullah's Taliban fighters dumped bodies near where her family lived.
"I heard my father talking about another three bodies lying at Green Chowk," she wrote in her diary, referring to a nearby roundabout.
A military offensive pushed Fazlullah out of Swat in 2009, but his men simply melted away across the border to Afghanistan. Earlier this year, they kidnapped and beheaded 17 Pakistani soldiers in one of several cross border raids.
Yousufzai continued speaking out despite the danger. As her fame grew, Fazlullah tried everything he could to silence her. The Taliban published death threats in the newspapers and slipped them under her door. But she ignored them.
The Taliban say that's why they sent assassins, despite a tribal code forbidding the killing of women.
"We had no intentions to kill her but were forced when she would not stop (speaking against us)," said Sirajuddin Ahmad, a spokesman of Swat Taliban now based in Afghanistan's Kunar province.
He said the Taliban held a meeting a few months ago at which they unanimously agreed to kill her. The task was then given to military commanders to carry out.
The militia has a force of around 100 men specialized in targeted killing, fighters said. They chose two men, aged between 20-30, who were locals from Swat Valley.
The gunmen had proved their worth in previous assassinations, killing an opposition politician and attacking a leading hotelier for "obscenity" in promoting tourism.
Their trademark is to kill by shots to the head.
Such hits, although dangerous, are also a badge of honor among the Taliban. The fighters who carry them out often receive personal calls of congratulations from senior leaders and may also get cash or guns.
Now it was Yousufzai's turn.
"Before the attack, the two fighters personally collected information about Malala's route to school, timing, the vehicle she used and her security," Ahmad said.
They decided to shoot her near a military checkpoint to make the point they could strike anywhere, he said.
On Tuesday, the two men stopped the bus she was riding home in. They asked for Yousufzai by name. Although the frightened girls said she wasn't there, the men fired at her and also hit two other girls in the van. One of them remains in critical condition.
Shot in the head and the neck, Yousufzai still lies unconscious in hospital, unaware that world leaders from U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to U.S. President Barack Obama have pledged support. Schoolchildren in Swat prayed for her recovery.
"The American people are shocked by this deplorable shooting of a girl who was targeted because she dared to attend school," a statement from the White House said.
On Wednesday, the singer Madonna dedicated a song to Yousufzai during a L.A. concert. In a gesture that bemused many Pakistanis, she performed a striptease that revealed Yousufzai's first name, Malala, written across her back.
Her would-be killers said they had no idea their attack would propel their victim, already a national hero, into a global icon.
"Actually the media gave it so much importance and now even Ban Ki-moon used dirty language against us," Ahmad said. The international community stayed silent when the Pakistani security forces killed women during a crackdown, he complained.
Now that they had failed to kill Yousufzai, they would target her father, Ahmad said.
Ziauddin Yousufzai, the headmaster of a girls' school, is on their hit list for speaking against them, his activities to promote peace in the region and for encouraging his daughter.
"We have a clear-cut stance. Anyone who takes side with the government against us will have to die at our hands," Ahmad warned. "You will see. Other important people will soon become victims."
Image: US AID 
Sources: J. M. Hughes et al. Clin. Infect. Dis. 51, 328?334 (2010)/who/Promed-mail
The talking heads at Valve continue to downplay the importance Windows plays in the future of PC gaming, pointing instead to Linux as an alternative in progress that's gaining steam (and Steam, for that matter). Serving as the latest indication that Valve has a growing affinity for Linux, software engineer Drew Bliss talked up the open source platform during a presentation at the Ubuntu Developer Summit.
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Public release date: 25-Oct-2012
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