Drug-resistant infections on the rise in American hospitals

Drug-resistant infections on the rise in American hospitals

Drug-resistant infections on the rise in American hospitals

April 9, 2005

A rise in flesh-eating staph infections has worried doctors about the possible spread of drug resistant bacteria.

Staphylococcus aureus, commonly known as staph, is a bacteria that commonly causes skin infections in otherwise healthy people. However, as a persistent threat in hospitals, it tends to infect patients who are already sick and whose systems are vulnerable due to IV lines that pierce the skin. Doctors have already battled for years against drug-resistant strains of the bacteria, but the struggle has generally been confined to hospitals.

Now, however, Methicillin Resistant Staph Aureus (MRSA) has been spreading in communities outside hospitals. Cases have multiplied by 25 times since 1998 at the University of Chicago. A Los Angeles hospital documented 14 cases of the flesh-eating infection, where patients required substantial time in intensive care and surgery. The infections are particularly problematic because nearly a quarter of people who get a staph infection require hospitalization.

Staph infections are spread much like other diseases, with crowded conditions, poor hygiene, and skin-to-skin contact most frequently to blame. At higher risk are prison inmates, homeless people, military personnel, and families with kids in day care. Athletes also have a higher risk, because sweating makes it easier for bacteria to infect the skin.

Ten April Fool’s pranks of 2009

Friday, April 3, 2009

April Fools’ Day pranks harmlessly pervaded worldwide again this year. Media outlets and internet sites have joined family, office workers, and friends to provide a wide variety of practical jokes. Ireland, France, and the United States celebrate April Fools all day, whereas a few countries celebrate jokes only until noon such as the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and South Africa.

Car and Driver claimed that GM and Chrysler were ordered out of NASCAR by the White House by the end of 2009 in order to receive any more government loans. There are press releases about this short-lived prank which received controversial feedback.

The Swiss Tourism Board has announced that volunteers were desperately needed, The Association of Mountain Cleaners “makes sure that our holiday guests can always enjoy perfect mountains. Using brooms, brushes, water and muscle power, they clean the rocks of any bird droppings.”

This year Gmail produced a new autopilot feature for April 1, 2009 which can read your email and automatically respond to every message.

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BMW released its new Magnetic Tow Technology which allows your BMW to magnetically attach to the vehicle ahead of you. This enhanced technology allows the driver to remove their foot from the gas pedal and turn off the motor.

The Guardian proposed its move to Twitter, which would allow the newspaper to fit its article content into 140 character messages or “tweets”. Included in this venture was the archiving of past events reported by The Guardian, such as, “1927 OMG first successful transatlantic air flight wow, pretty cool! Boring day otherwise *sigh*”

Google’s technological break through for April Fool’s Day was CADIE, (Cognitive Autoheuristic Distributed-Intelligence Entity). By extracting internet search patterns combined with Brain Search, a part of CADIE technology, Google can now search your thoughts and memories.

Wikipedia even fooled Fox News who claimed that “every item on the home page of the user-generated site Wikipedia is fake. The featured Wikipedia article regaled the “Museum of Bad Art” in Boston.” However, each item on the main page was based on reality — even news articles such as NASA reports a shower of diamonds over the Republic of Sudan, which was based on a meteorite which passed over Sudan whose fragments did reveal diamonds upon discovery.

The Conficker Internet worm had been in the news warning of a worst case scenario when computers worldwide would be affected by the virus. Even the chief security adviser for Microsoft, Ed Gibson, didn’t want to make any predictions about what would happen. Experts just knew that it was set to go off on April 1. Several anomalous happenings were attributed to Conficker including Leroy “Mac” MacElrie who claimed to be the programmer of the Conficker worm and turned himself in to police.

Hotels.com ran an advertisement offering hotel room bookings on the moon which would be offered on European websites starting at £800 a night.

Qualcomm ingeniously revealed a new wireless networking technology called wireless convergence. Making use of the flight patterns of pigeons. They then use innovative solutions to converge the birds with wolves to protect the internal improvements.

Media outlets were not the only ones pulling pranks. Gaming websites across the internet Blizzard, Joystiq, and affiliates posted reviews and announcements of games with tongue in cheek. YouTube offered viewers a unique April Fool’s experience as videos were offered upside down. In Ireland, U2 fans received a U2opia concert on a shopping centre roof top concert rather than the real thing.

How To Find Advance Auto Parts Coupons

By Mindy Claribel

Do you need to purchase auto parts? Advance Auto Parts is the answer to your need. Advance Auto Parts is one of the largest stores that sell replacement and other spare parts and vehicular accessories for your automobile. Of course, with high-quality vehicle items, you can expect to incur high costs as well. But do not worry, because you have many choices that can help you cut your costs when your purchase at Advance Auto Parts.

Search for deals online – The first thing you can do is to find the best Advance Auto Parts saving deals. You can use your preferred search engine to look for Advance Auto Parts coupons and other promo codes which can be used for savings. Just be keen on finding valid Advance Auto Parts coupons and be sure that they have not expired yet, or else, they will be of no use.

Check out their website – When you need to find Advance Auto Parts coupons and saving promos, always remember to check out their online page. Usually, stores will post all their best deals on their own website. So go on and check http://advanceautoparts.com if you want authentic and up-to-date saving coupons.

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Sign up for their newsletter – Another thing you can do is to sign-up for Advance Auto Parts newsletter. By doing so, you will not need to check their website every now and then, as they will already deliver all the news and updates about the store, including the best Advance Auto parts Coupons and other promotions, straight to your inbox. So if you do not want to miss any deal that the site will give away, do not forget to join their mailing list.

Check out eBay – Also, do not forget to check out eBay and other buy and sell websites. Not all people who have been given Advance Auto Parts coupons have uses for it. There are some people who have coupons and know some promo codes, but because they do not intend to use them, they just opt to sell it on eBay. Of course, you might need to pay for the coupons, nevertheless, what is a dollar or two that you spend compare to a 10% discount coupon, right?

Check out your local mail Check out your newspaper, especially on Sunday when you want to find some deals. Most auto parts stores in your area are going to place some coupons as well as sales in their ad.

Look for specials Instead of searching for coupons, you may want to look for specials instead. Youre going to find that there are some great deals out there that are even better than a coupon itself.

The next time you will be needing auto parts, check out Advance Auto Parts, and do not forget those sweet coupons and saving deals! Youre going to find that if you follow the deals up above, you should be able to save on your purchase. As long as you search hard, you will find that anything is possible for a great price!

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Coalition ups ante on Australian school tax rebates

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Australian opposition leader Tony Abbott has pledged private school relief if the Liberal/National coalition wins the upcoming federal election. The pledge came in response to the Australian Labor Party leader, and current Prime Minister, Julia Gillard proposing a uniform and school equipment tax break expansion.

Abbott’s proposal includes an offer of tax rebates for sending a child to a private school. For students in primary school, prep to grade 6, the rebate will rise to $500 Australian a year per student and families will be then able to claim 50% rebate up to $1000.

“We are expanding the rebate so it can be claimed for school fees and also for other educational costs such as tuition and special educational costs for children with, for instance, dyslexia,” Abbott said at a press conference in Brisbane.

Before the election was called, Gillard had aimed to pledge $220 million over four years to expand the current tax breaks to cover refunds each worth $390 for primary school uniforms and $779 for high school uniforms, as well as refunds for other school equipment like texts books and computers.

“We all know that uniforms can be an expensive part of sending kids to school, but this change, along with the existing refund for textbooks and computers, will help families with that cost,” stated Gillard.

An opposition spokesperson claimed that the “obvious flaw in Labor’s policy is that it only applies to stationery, computer expenses and uniforms […] You know as a parent that you need help for a whole range of expenses. Extra teachers for children with dyslexia or the costs of doing music and all the other expenses like excursions and so forth.”

The expansion is expected to cost $760 million in total and one that Abbott claims needs to happen as “cost of living pressures tend to be greatest when your kids are at school”.

Al Sharpton speaks out on race, rights and what bothers him about his critics

Monday, December 3, 2007

At Thanksgiving dinner David Shankbone told his white middle class family that he was to interview Reverend Al Sharpton that Saturday. The announcement caused an impassioned discussion about the civil rights leader’s work, the problems facing the black community and whether Sharpton helps or hurts his cause. Opinion was divided. “He’s an opportunist.” “He only stirs things up.” “Why do I always see his face when there’s a problem?”

Shankbone went to the National Action Network’s headquarters in Harlem with this Thanksgiving discussion to inform the conversation. Below is his interview with Al Sharpton on everything from Tawana Brawley, his purported feud with Barack Obama, criticism by influential African Americans such as Clarence Page, his experience running for President, to how he never expected he would see fifty (he is now 53). “People would say to me, ‘Now that I hear you, even if I disagree with you I don’t think you’re as bad as I thought,'” said Sharpton. “I would say, ‘Let me ask you a question: what was “bad as you thought”?’ And they couldn’t say. They don’t know why they think you’re bad, they just know you’re supposed to be bad because the right wing tells them you’re bad.”

Contents

  • 1 Sharpton’s beginnings in the movement
  • 2 James Brown: a father to Sharpton
  • 3 Criticism: Sharpton is always there
  • 4 Tawana Brawley to Megan Williams
  • 5 Sharpton and the African-American media
  • 6 Why the need for an Al Sharpton?
  • 7 Al Sharpton and Presidential Politics
  • 8 On Barack Obama
  • 9 The Iraq War
  • 10 Sharpton as a symbol
  • 11 Blacks and whites and talking about race
  • 12 Don Imus, Michael Richards and Dog The Bounty Hunter
  • 13 Sources

The Onion: An interview with ‘America’s Finest News Source’

Sunday, November 25, 2007

Despite the hopes of many University of Wisconsin-Madison (UW) students, The Onion was not named after their student center. “People always ask questions about where the name The Onion came from,” said President Sean Mills in an interview with David Shankbone, “and when I recently asked Tim Keck, who was one of the founders, he told me the name—I’ve never heard this story about ‘see you at the un-yun’—he said it was literally that his Uncle said he should call it The Onion when he saw him and Chris Johnson eating an onion sandwich. They had literally just cut up the onion and put it on bread.” According to Editorial Manager Chet Clem, their food budget was so low when they started the paper that they were down to white bread and onions.

Long before The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, Heck and Johnson envisioned a publication that would parody the news—and news reporting—when they were students at UW in 1988. Since its inception, The Onion has become a veritable news parody empire, with a print edition, a website that drew 5,000,000 unique visitors in the month of October, personal ads, a 24 hour news network, podcasts, and a recently launched world atlas called Our Dumb World. Al Gore and General Tommy Franks casually rattle off their favorite headlines (Gore’s was when The Onion reported he and Tipper were having the best sex of their lives after his 2000 Electoral College defeat). Many of their writers have gone on to wield great influence on Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert‘s news parody shows.

And we are sorry to break the news to all you amateur headline writers: your submissions do not even get read.

Below is David Shankbone’s interview with Chet Clem and Sean Mills about the news empire that has become The Onion.

Contents

  • 1 How The Onion writes an issue
  • 2 The headlines
  • 3 The features and the columnists
  • 4 The photojournalism
  • 5 What The Onion will not publish
  • 6 Reactions to Onion stories
  • 7 The Presidential Seal
  • 8 The Onion’s readership
  • 9 Future features
  • 10 Handling national tragedies
  • 11 The Onion movie and Onion News Network
  • 12 Relationship with other satirical news programs
  • 13 Unsolicited material
  • 14 Source

NASA considers continuing shuttle use after 2010

Sunday, August 31, 2008

Michael Griffin, administrator of the American space agency, NASA has ordered a study into considering the possibility of continuing the usage of the Space Shuttle, a space vehicle that takes astronauts to the International Space Station. The agency originally planned to retire all shuttles in 2010 after mission STS-134, but concerns over staff job losses that were created by the Space Shuttle program caused Griffin to order the study. The space crafts have been in use since 1981 and it’s replacements, the Ares rockets, will not be in use until 2015 causing a 5 year gap where NASA will have no manned space flights, which is the reason the agency is considering extending usage for five more years, when the vehicles can be immediately replaced by their successors.

We want to focus on helping bridge the gap of U.S. vehicles traveling to the ISS (International Space Station) as efficiently as possible.

The news came from a leaked email which was obtained from the Los Angeles Times. NASA officials have confirmed the email’s authenticity, but have stated that it is too early to decide whether or not the shuttle use will continue.

Griffin has originally been against the continuation of the shuttle, as it would damage the funding of Project Constellation, a project that involves sending astronauts to the Moon and Mars.

If NASA chooses not to continue the space shuttle, they would rely on the Russian Federal Space Agency and their Soyuz space vehicles in the five year gap of no American space flights. To do this, they would have to purchase seats on Soyuz missions. However, because of the recent events that have transpired over the Georgia conflict, US and Russian relations have been damaged, so it is believed unwise to work with the Russian agency.

Bottled water in Canada recalled due to arsenic concerns

Friday, March 16, 2007

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) issued a health hazard alert, March 14, 2007, regarding Ark Land brand of bottled water, Naturally Carbonated Mineral Water. It is warning the public not to consume the product, as it may contain arsenic.

Although there have been no reported illnesses associated with the consumption of this product, Arsenic is a toxic substance and a human carcinogen.

The CFIA did not indicate, in the Alert, what levels of arsenic were found in the product.

The mineral water was sold in Ontario and Quebec, but may have also been distributed throughout Canada. The product, produced by Arzni Source, was imported from Armenia by Klukva Pure Inc., of Toronto.

The importer, Klukva Pure Inc., has begun the removal of product from store shelves, under the direction of the CFIA.

The product recall affects the following Ark Land brand Naturally Carbonated Mineral Water:

Size: 330 mL, UPC: 7 85000 12033 9
Size: 500 mL, UPC: 7 85000 12050 6

Both sizes show a “Best Before” date of 09.05.07

For more information, consumers and industry are encouraged to call the CFIA at 1-800-442-2342.

Campaigners angry at new British police tracking system

Thursday, May 12, 2011

Civil liberties campaigners have reacted angrily to the announcement that the largest police force in Britain has purchased a revolutionary computer system which will allow them to track everything a person does online in a three-dimensional graphic. The Metropolitan Police service, responsible for policing London, announced the purchase of Geotime, a computer program which can correlate information from satellites, mobile phones, social networking websites, IP logs and financial transactions. The software is already used by the U.S. military.

This latest tool could also be used in a wholly invasive way and could fly in the face of the role of the police to facilitate rather than impede the activities of democratic protesters.

Lawyers and campaigners have questioned whether innocent individuals may be tracked by the software, likened to a computer program in the science fiction film Minority Report. Sarah McSherry, a lawyer representing a number of protesters, raised fears officers could breach data protection laws by tracking innocent protesters, endangering the democratic rights of demonstrators. “We have already seen the utilisation of a number of tactics which infringe the right to peaceful protest, privacy and freedom of expression, assembly and movement. All of these have a chilling effect on participation in peaceful protest,” she said. “This latest tool could also be used in a wholly invasive way and could fly in the face of the role of the police to facilitate rather than impede the activities of democratic protesters.”

Geotime correlates information from numerous sources allowing intelligence officers to view effectively every online move made by individuals, and its website says it can link one suspect to others. The computer software can reportedly create links between people and reveal relationships and private communications, disclosing “temporal patterns and behaviours.” A product director at the parent company, Oculus, said the program is available to purchase commercially.

A number of academics and intelligence experts have said the program could lead to more convictions in terrorism and organised crime investigations, with one professor describing its use as “absolutely right.” In contrast, an official at Privacy International called on police to explain how the software would be used. “Once millions and millions of pieces of microdata are aggregated, you end up with this very high-resolution picture of somebody, and this is effectively what they are doing here,” he said. “We shouldn’t be tracked and traced and have pictures built by our own government and police for the benefit of commercial gain.”

Data protection in Britain has become a major issue among public debate in recent years. The most recent controversy to emerge came last week after an elderly man with no criminal record was given permission to take senior officers who systematically recorded details of his attendance at peaceful protests to the High Court. The Metropolitan Police have not yet confirmed how the computer system will be used, but they are researching numerous possibilities; a spokesperson said they were still assessing whether they would permanently use the technology but declined to confirm how much it cost.

Oral B 8900 The Irrigator Leaves Your Teeth Beautifully Clean! Oral B Top Seller!

Oral B 8900 – The Irrigator Leaves Your Teeth Beautifully Clean! Oral B Top Seller!

by

Erik Ortega

The Oral B 8900, also known as the Oral B ProfessionalCare 8900 DLX OxyJet Oral Care Center, is another addition to the Oral B toothbrush line of quality and useful electric toothbrushes. Unlike Sonicare toothbrushes, which lately seem to produce the same toothbrush over and over again just with different names, Oral B tends to incorporate useful and unique features to each of its models. The Oral B 8900 does just that.

Oral B ProfessionalCare 8900 dlx Oxyjet center Features:

* FlexiSoft Brush head helps get in between your teeth to give your teeth a deep cleaning

* ProBright Brush head is to be used when you want that polished white look on your teeth

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* Inter-dental cleaners to easily floss your teeth

* Tongue Freshner helps clean your tongue and rid it of nasty odor causing bacteria

* Professional Timer alerts you when to switch your brushing to different parts of your teeth

* Pressure sensor alerts when too much pressure is being applied to your teeth

* 40,000 back and forth pulsations with 8,800 oscillations per minute

* Oxy Jet water stream with different modes that help remove food debris with ease, similar to the Water Pik

Oral B 8900 Experience

The Oral B 8900 provides the same type of cleaning I loved with the Oral B Triumph 9900. This brush really gives you that feeling that you’re getting a thorough and proper cleaning of your teeth. Especially with the rounded, dentist inspired brushes which replicate the dentist tools.

The other features, such as the floss head provides a much needed mechanical flossing strategy and the tongue refresher really helps to finish off the thorough cleaning.

Oral b 8900 DLX OxyJet center

My favorite part about this toothbrush, besides the fact that it is the only powered toothbrush to offer 3D cleaning action is the OxyJet irrigator. This allows micro-bubble technology to remove the bacteria that causes plaque. It does this by mixing air and water, which produces the micro bubbles that get deep in between your teeth.

Want to know more about this toothbrush and to find some of the lowest prices on the net for them? Click Here–> Oral B 8900For more ratings on other toothbrushes, visit my site Electric Toothbrush Ratingshttp://electrictoothbrushratingsonline.com/oral-b-8900/

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