Posts filed under 'news'
Blog: Bank alert over ‘chemical’ spill
bank customer sparked an alert when he spilled a substance on the floor during an argument with staff.
The substance, described as a chemical, leaked out of the man’s bag at Yorkshire Bank on Abingdon Street, Blackpool, on Saturday morning.
Emergency services were alerted after a member of staff became “woozy” while cleaning it up and three people were taken to hospital as a precaution.
Police said there was “no malicious intent” in the man’s actions.
No offence had been committed, they added.
The man became irate after being told the coins he was trying to deposit were not bagged properly
He then bent down to rummage in his bag and the substance spilled out over the floor. At that point he was asked to leave.
Staff alerted the emergency services after a cleaner began to feel ill while trying to clear up the substance.
Firefighters attended and cordoned the area off while an analyst was called to identify the chemical.
“The county analyst could not find anything to identify what the substance was,” said watch commander Alan Priestly of Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service.
“He couldn’t find any trace of the substance within the carpet or the tissues used to clean it up.”
A spokesman for Lancashire Police said officers spoke to the man and were satisfied it was an accident.
Police do not have a record of what the chemical was.
Blog: Radiation
This position is disputed by some scientists, including Professor Denis Henshaw of Bristol University.
He questions the conclusions of the latest study, published in the British Journal of Cancer.
“Country studies have not had enough statistical power to see an increase of childhood leukaemia near power lines,” he told BBC News Online.
“The pooled analysis of country studies has clearly shown a doubling of child leukaemia at levels well below what you get under power lines.”
He believes melatonin plays a role in protecting the body against damage that can lead to leukaemia and may be disrupted by strong magnetic fields.
“The study carried out by Dr Lloyd and colleagues did not involve melatonin,” said Professor Henshaw. “Therefore, while publication of this study is to be welcomed, failure to observe an effect of magnetic fields on these cells may be unsurprising.”
The latest study used blood cells from a donor to test the effect of magnetic fields on the normal repair process.
The researchers blasted cells with radiation to create the sort of damage that leads to cancer.
They found that the cells repaired themselves naturally, even if they were exposed to stronger magnetic fields than those found in British homes.
Blog: Eurovision acts set for showdown
The six acts hoping to represent the UK in the Eurovision Song Contest are facing their biggest test yet.
Under the glaring lights of the BBC’s main studio at Television Centre in London, the singers are tackling rehearsals for the first live show on Saturday night.
The floor is crawling with production staff, the set is lit with the colours of the Union Jack, and the band strikes up with Abba’s Eurovision classic Waterloo.
The acts run through their group performance of the song with great success, the opener for Your Country Needs You.
They may be just getting to grips with working on television, but for one act, the dream will come to an end on Saturday.
With nothing more than the barest piano accompaniment in a corner of the studio, Welshman Mark Evans powers through his song first.
“Keep your voice open,” says Lloyd Webber, who gives musical guidance to each of his charges.
“He’s a very talented boy and has a very good presence,” he remarks, while the 23-year-old dashes across town to appear in panto.
Five-piece vocal harmony group Emperors of Soul are a different prospect altogether.
“I’m a fat lot of use with them!” Lloyd Webber says of his mentoring skills with the slick quintet.
The Twins – Nicola and Francine Gleadall – demonstrate their unique vocal blend, but require a little more coaching.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if the British public falls in love with them,” says Lloyd Webber, aware that viewers will have the ultimate say over who goes to Moscow in May.
Blog: schedule for peace in Kosovo
In a declaration hammered out on Friday, the US, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Russia, gave Yugoslav and ethnic Albanian leaders a maximum of 21 days to finalise a settlement which would give the troubled province of Kosovo “substantial autonomy”.
The ultimatum which UK Foreign Secretary Robin Cook took to Yugoslavia summoned the two sides to begin talks at Rambouillet, near Paris, by 6 February.
The warring parties would have one week from that date to reach an accord, although it could be extended for up to seven more days if the talks made real progress.
The group threatened to “hold both sides accountable if they fail to take the opportunity now offered to them”.
With Nato planes on a 48-hour standby, correspondents take this to mean that the Atlantic alliance would be ready to launch air strikes if the parties ignored demands to come to the table.
The negotiations, to be chaired by Mr Cook and his French counterpart Hubert V閐rine, should reach an accord on the basis of the Contact Group’s plans for “substantial autonomy” for the province.
This would give Kosovo an elected assembly, a local, non-Serb-dominated security force, and an international armed presence to police the peace settlement.
And in no uncertain terms, the six nations called on both sides to halt hostilities.
“The escalation in violence for which both Belgrade’s security forces and the KLA are responsible must be stopped. Repression of civilians by the security forces must end and those forces must be withdrawn,” they said.
Blog:Home front
In the UK, 27% of carbon dioxide emissions come from the energy we use to heat (and light) our homes.
It is not only carbon that’s going out of the window – and for that matter the roof, walls and floor – it is our hard earned money.
But imagine if we could transform our homes from leaky, draughty places that guzzle energy, into more comfortable, brighter, places – warmer in winter and cooler in summer – with smaller bills.
Imagine if we could do that without it costing consumers a penny, or landing a hefty bill at the government’s door.
And in the process, also create thousands of new jobs in green home refurbishment.
Unrealistic? Not necessarily.
The UK Green Building Council is demanding that the government – either this one or the next – should introduce a scheme that will kick-start this refurbishment revolution.
It is called “Pay As You Save”. It’s based on a simple premise: that the cost of installing energy efficiency measures be funded through the future savings made on that household’s energy bills.
So how does it work? The majority of home energy efficiency measures pay for themselves over a period of time.
Some are quite cheap, such as loft and cavity wall insulation or low-energy lighting.
But others are more expensive, such as suspended wooden floor insulation, new A-rated boilers and particularly solid wall insulation.
Most of us put off installing these measures, particularly the more expensive ones, because we do not think we will get the benefit. It just costs too much upfront; and given we move house, on average, every seven years, why bother?
Pay As You Save is designed to address this problem. Firstly, the upfront cost of measures, for example £10,000, is put up by a third party (such as a bank, retailer or local authority), not the consumer.
Blog:Food allergy clinic opens for mums-to-be
Mothers-to-be who are worried that they may have a food allergy that they can pass on to their children will be able to get advice on healthy eating from a new private clinic.
The Ante-Natal Allergy Screening Service has been set up in Chelsea, London, by Individual Wellbeing Diagnostic Laboratories in the wake of the government’s warning about peanut allergy.
Chief Medical Officer Sir Kenneth Calman recently warned pregnant women who are allergic to peanuts to steer clear of the nut during their pregnancy.
If one parent has a food allergy, there is up to a 40% chance that they will pass it on to their children. If both have the allergy, the risk increases to 70%.
If the mother steers clear of the problem food during her pregnancy, the risk can be minimised.
Peanut allergy is one of the most common and can prove fatal. Other common food problems include allergies to wheat and dairy products.
Individual Wellbeing Diagnostic Laboratories has been taking referrals from GPs for some time, but it is setting up the clinic to make the service more accessible.
It is early days since the Calman announcement, but the laboratories predict an increase in demand from expectant mothers who did not previously know about the risks.
Business manager James Cook says many people do not know they have an allergy.
“People go to their GP complaining of digestive disorders or migraines. They do not realise they are acutely allergic to a food which they are eating two or three times a week,” he said.
Blog:President’s ‘HIV cure’ condemned
A claim by Gambian President Yahya Jammeh that he can cure Aids in three days has been lambasted by a leading South African HIV/Aids specialist.
“I’m astonished. The danger of a president standing up [to say this] is shocking,” Jerry Coovadia told the BBC.
Mr Jammeh said last month he had begun treating 10 patients on Thursdays with secret medicinal herb ingredients.
His health minister backs his claims, saying in trials so far patients had gained weight and physically improved.
“A response within three to 10 days and a three-day course is almost inconceivable for a disease like HIV/Aids,” said Prof Coovadia, who heads the HIV research team at the University of KwaZulu Natal and is a member of South Africa’s Treatment Action Campaign.
He said that science was many years away from finding a cure “so the fact that someone announces a cure like this is exceedingly difficult to accept”.
Blog:More research needed
It is not yet clear what the connection could be between alcohol and breast cancer, though the researchers offered various possibilities.
Alcohol could cause cancer directly, it could hinder the bodies own cancer protection, and it stimulates the release of oestrogen which is known to increase cancer risk.
The report calls for more research looking at overall risk to women from drinking, taking heart disease, traffic and domestic accidents, and other issues into consideration.
Those drinking six drinks a day appeared to have only a 31% higher breast cancer risk, but researchers noted that less than 1% of women sampled drank that much so the results could be due to measurement errors.
The surveys analysed covered 322,647 women from around the world.
Blog: Kurram, Orakzai, Khyber
As the Pakistani military strategists who organised Afghan guerillas against the Soviets in the 1980s discovered to their delight, Kurram is the best location along the entire Pakistan-Afghanistan border to put pressure on the Afghan capital, Kabul, which is just 90km (56 miles) away. But because the region is inhabited by a Shia tribe that opposes the Taliban for religious reasons, the Taliban have not been able to get a foothold here.
The Taliban, with their primary interest in the war in Afghanistan, have also steered clear of Orakzai tribal district because it does not share a border with Afghanistan and is therefore of no strategic value.
But Taliban groups motivated by sectarian strife, or those trying to drive Pakistani forces out of the tribal region, have set up bases both in the Lower Kurram region, where there are few Shias, and Orakzai.
This area links up with the town of Mir Ali in North Waziristan to the south, and Afridi tribal territory in Darra Adamkhel and Khyber in the north. It is overseen by Hakimullah Mehsud (alias Zulfiqar Mehsud), a deputy of top Pakistani Taliban commander Baitullah Mehsud and a cousin of Qari Hussain, another deputy of Baitullah Mehsud’s who is known for running training camps for suicide bombers in South Waziristan.
Hakimullah Mehsud is believed to command an armed force of more than 2,000 fighters of varying ability. From their bases in Orakzai and areas north of Mir Ali in North Waziristan, these fighters have tried to squeeze the Shias of Upper Kurram valley and those living in the Hangu distict of Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province (NWFP).
Blog:GPs warn on internet drug sales
Doctors have warned of the perils of buying medicines over the internet.
One in four GPs polled said they had treated patients for adverse reactions to medicines bought online.
A further 8% suspected they had treated side-effects of internet-bought drugs, the snapshot survey of 420 doctors carried out by GP magazine found.
Pharmacist leaders urged the public to be aware of the risks of internet medicines and use bone fide sites which require a prescription.
Overall, 85% of the GP respondents want online pharmacies to be more tightly regulated.
The Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain has estimated that two million Britons regularly buy drugs over the internet, a figure which is thought to be on the rise.
This includes those who purchase medicines prescribed by their doctor from a legitimate online pharmacy.
But it is common for illegal internet pharmacies to promote “lifestyle” medicines, such as those for erectile dysfunction, slimming pills, hair-loss treatments, and anti-depressants.
Medicines regulators said these drugs are in high demand due to the perceived “embarrassment” factor and the fact that a GP may not prescribe them to the particular patient for one reason or another.
The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency said increasingly people are purchasing drugs that may not be available via the NHS due to cost-restrictions.
