Germany’s Merck Serono to produce medicines in UAE
Label: HealthABU DHABI (Reuters) – Germany’s Merck Serono said it would team up with an Abu Dhabi firm to produce medicines for the domestic and regional markets, the first multinational of its kind to make branded products in the United Arab Emirates.
Merck Serono, the pharmaceutical arm of Merck KGaA, will initially produce two of its products at Neopharma‘s facilities in Abu Dhabi, the German firm’s first such partnership in the Middle East, the company’s CEO said.
“The Middle East is very important and the fastest growing region for our products,” Stefan Oschmann told reporters. “We plan to meet 100 percent of the regional demand for the products,” he added.
Oschmann declined to give specific figures but said revenues from emerging markets accounted for a third of Merck‘s total.
The two products to be produced at Neopharma’s facilities are Euthyrox, a synthetic thyroid hormone and Glucophage, for people suffering from type 2 diabetes.
Production of both branded products will start in 2013.
The UAE suffers from a high prevalence of diabetes. Some 827,000 people between the ages of 20 and 79 have diabetes in the UAE, according to the Ministry of Health.
Treatment of diabetes accounts for about 40 percent of the UAE’s overall healthcare expenditure, Amin al Amiri, assistant under-secretary for Medical practice & license at the ministry of health said.
“This alliance will provide increased supply of trusted branded medicines needed to help ease the diabetes crisis which is straining the financial resources of the UAE,” he said.
The Middle East is the largest market for Merck’s diabetes drug, Glucophage, which is currently imported from Europe.
(Reporting By Stanley Carvalho; Editing by Sami Aboudi and Helen Massy-Beresford)
Health News Headlines – Yahoo! News
Italy votes for center-left candidate for premier
Label: WorldROME (AP) — Italians are choosing a center-left candidate for premier for elections early next year, an important primary runoff given the main party is ahead in the polls against a center-right camp in utter chaos over whether Silvio Berlusconi will run again.
Sunday’s runoff pits a veteran center-left leader, Pier Luigi Bersani, 61, against the 37-year-old mayor of Florence, Matteo Renzi, who has campaigned on an Obama-style “Let’s change Italy now” mantra.
Nearly all polls show Bersani winning the primary, after he won the first round of balloting Nov. 25 with 44.9 percent of the vote. Since he didn’t get an absolute majority, he was forced into a runoff with Renzi, who garnered 35.5 percent.
After battling all week to get more voters to the polling stations for round two, Renzi seemed almost resigned to a Bersani win by Sunday, saying he hoped that by Monday “we can all work together.”
Bersani, a former transport and industry minister, seemed confident of victory as well, joking about Berlusconi’s flip-flopping political ambitions by asking “What time did he say it?” when told that the media mogul had purportedly decided against running.
Next year’s general election will largely decide how and whether Italy continues on the path to financial health charted by Premier Mario Monti, appointed last year to save Italy from a Greek-style debt crisis.
The former European commissioner was named to head a technical government after international markets lost confidence in then-Premier Berlusconi’s ability to reign in Italy’s public debt and push through sorely needed structural reforms.
Berlusconi has largely stayed out of the public spotlight for the past year, but he returned with force in recent weeks, announcing he was thinking about running again, then changing his mind, then threatening to bring down Monti’s government, and most recently staying silent about his political plans.
His waffling has thrown his People of Freedom party into disarray and disrupted its own plans for a primary — all of which has only seemed to bolster the impression of order, stability and organization within the center-left camp.
A poll published Friday gave the Democratic Party 30 percent of the vote if the election were held now, compared with some 19.5 percent for the upstart populist movement of comic Beppe Grillo, and Berlusconi’s People of Freedom party in third with 14.3 percent. The poll, by the SWG firm for state-run RAI 3, surveyed 5,000 voting-age adults by telephone between Nov. 26 and 28. It had a margin of error of plus or minus 1.36 percentage points.
It’s quite a turnabout for Berlusconi’s once-dominant movement, and a similarly remarkable shift in fortunes for the Democratic Party, which had been in shambles for years, unable to capitalize on Berlusconi’s professional and personal failings while he was premier.
But Berlusconi’s 2011 downfall and a series of recent political party funding scandals that have targeted mostly center-right politicians have contributed to the party’s rise as Italy struggles through a grinding recession and near-record high unemployment.
Angelino Alfano, Berlusconi’s hand-picked political heir, seemed again exasperated Sunday after a long meeting with his patron over Berlusconi’s plans. News reports have suggested Berlusconi might split the party in two and re-launch the Forza Italia party that brought him to political power for the first time in 1994.
“We have to work to reconstruct the center-right, and reconstructing it means having a big center-right party,” not a divided one, Alfano said.
He added that Berlusconi didn’t say one way or another if he would run himself. “It’s his choice,” he said. “If there are any decisions in this regard, he’ll be the one to say so.”
___
Follow Nicole Winfield at www.twitter.com/nwinfield
Europe News Headlines – Yahoo! News
German producers plan Pope Benedict biopic
Label: LifestyleMUNICH, Germany (Reuters) – Two German producers have bought the film rights to an upcoming biography of Pope Benedict by the Bavarian author of three best-selling interview books with the pontiff.
The Odeon Film company said producers Marcus Mende and Peter Weckert planned a film for international release based on a biography by journalist Peter Seewald due to be published in early 2014.
Seewald’s book-length interviews with Benedict – two as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and one as pope – have given readers many insights into the life and thoughts of the shy theologian who now heads the Roman Catholic Church.
Seewald has signed on as a consultant to the scriptwriter, Odeon Film said in a statement on Thursday. It gave no information about the schedule for the film or who might play the main role.
“The producers plan an international film that illustrates all aspects of the extraordinary life and work of Joseph Ratzinger from his birth on Easter night in 1927 in Marktl am Inn in Bavaria to his pontificate today,” it said.
Benedict’s predecessor Pope John Paul was the subject of a dozen documentary films around the world and two major television movies in the United States.
(Reporting by Tom Heneghan; editing by Andrew Roche)
Movies News Headlines – Yahoo! News
Cargo plane crashes in Brazzaville, 3 dead
Label: WorldBRAZZAVILLE, Republic of Congo (AP) — A cargo plane owned by a private company crashed Friday near the airport in Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of Congo, killing at least three people, officials said.
The Soviet-made Ilyushin-76 belonged to Trans Air Congo and appeared to be transporting merchandise, not people, said an aviation official who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
The plane was coming from Congo‘s second-largest city, Pointe Noire, and tried to land during heavy rain, he said.
Ambulances rushed to the scene in the Makazou neighborhood, located near the airport, but emergency workers were hampered by the lack of light in this capital, which like so many in Africa has a chronic shortage of electricity.
“At the moment, my team is having a hard time searching for survivors in order to find the victims of the crash because there is no light and also because of the rain,” Congolese Red Cross head Albert Mberi said.
He said that realistically, they will only be able to launch a proper search Saturday, when the sun comes up.
Reporters at the scene fought through a wall of smoke. Despite the darkness, they could make out the smoldering remains of the plane, including what looked like the left wing of the aircraft. A little bit further on, emergency workers identified the body of the plane’s Ukrainian pilot, and covered the corpse in a blanket.
Firefighters were trying to extinguish the blaze of a part of the plane that had fallen into a ravine. They were using their truck lights to try to illuminate the scene of the crash. Although the plane was carrying merchandise, emergency workers fear that there could be more people on board.
Because of the state of the road connecting Pointe Noire to Brazzaville, many traders prefer to fly the roughly 400 kilometers (250 miles).
Africa has some of the worst air safety records in the world. In June, a commercial jetliner crashed in Lagos, Nigeria, killing 153 people, just a few days after a cargo plane clipped a bus in neighboring Ghana, killing 10.
Africa News Headlines – Yahoo! News
“Honey Boo Boo” star arrested for going ape on Georgia Freeway
Label: LifestyleLOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – If you tend to believe that the cast members of TLC reality series “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo” are less than totally evolved, rejoice; this story might just confirm your suspicions.
“Crazy” Tony Lindsey – the cousin of “Honey Boo Boo”‘s titular star Alana Thompson” – was arrested in Georgia earlier this week following a goofy, but dangerous, stunt involving a gorilla suit, TMZ reports.
A police report says that Lindsey was among a group of men arrested for reckless behavior after one of them, dressed in a gorilla suit, prepared to jump into a lane along Highway 20 at approximately 11 p.m. Unfortunately for the band of wrongheaded pranksters, Deputy Joe Rozier happened to be driving by as he was about to take the leap from the side of the road.
“I observed a white male dressed in a gorilla suit acting as if he was going to jump into my lane of travel. I swerved into the left lane to avoid an accident with the person,” Rozier said in a police report.
Rozier took pursuit, and “observed several white males run up the embankment and into the woods,” the report notes. After threatening to release his police dog, he heard a voice yell back, “You don’t have to do that, we’re coming back.”
A group of five adults and two minors emerged – but with no gorilla suit. After a while, however, they admitted to hiding the suit in the woods.
It’s not known if Lindsey was the one in gorilla suit, or if the stunt will be incorporated into an upcoming episode of “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo.”
A spokesperson for the show has not yet responded to TheWrap’s request for comment.
TV News Headlines – Yahoo! News
Cold, mold loom as hazards in Sandy disaster zones
Label: HealthNEW YORK (AP) — A month after Sandy’s floodwaters swept up his block, punched a hole in his foundation and drowned his furnace, John Frawley still has no electricity or heat in his dilapidated home on the Rockaway seashore.
The 57-year-old, who also lost his car and all his winter clothes in the flood, now spends his nights shivering in a pair of donated snow pants, worrying whether the cold might make his chronic heart condition worse.
“I’ve been coughing like crazy,” said Frawley, a former commercial fisherman disabled by a spine injury. He said his family doesn’t have the money to pay for even basic repairs. So far, he has avoided going to a shelter, saying he’d rather sleep in his own home.
“But I’m telling you, I can’t stay here much longer,” he said.
City officials estimate at least 12,000 New Yorkers are trying to survive in unheated, flood-damaged homes, despite warnings that dropping temperatures could pose a health risk.
The chill is only one of the potential environmental hazards that experts say might endanger people trying to resume their lives in the vast New York and New Jersey disaster zone.
Uncounted numbers of families have returned to coastal homes that are contaminated with mold, which can aggravate allergies and leave people perpetually wheezing. Others have been sleeping in houses filled with construction dust, as workers have ripped out walls and flooring. That dust can sometimes trigger asthma.
But it is the approaching winter that has some public health officials worried most. Nighttime temperatures have been around freezing and stand to drop in the coming weeks.
New York City‘s health department said the number of people visiting hospital emergency rooms for cold-related problems has already doubled this November, compared with previous years. Those statistics are likely only the proverbial tip of the iceberg.
Mortality rates for the elderly and chronically ill rise when people live for extended periods in unheated apartments, even when the temperature is still above freezing, said the city’s health commissioner, Dr. Thomas Farley.
“As the temperatures get colder, the risk increases,” he said. “It is especially risky for the elderly. I really want to encourage people, if they don’t have heat in their apartment, to look elsewhere.”
Since the storm, the health department has been sending National Guard troops door to door, trying to persuade people to leave cold homes until their heating systems are fixed. The city is also carrying out a plan to spend hundreds of millions of dollars helping residents make emergency repairs needed to restore their heat and hot water.
Convincing people that they could be endangering themselves by staying until that work is complete, though, isn’t always easy.
For weeks, Eddie Saman, 57, slept on sheets of plywood in the frigid, ruined shell of his flooded Staten Island bungalow. He stayed even as the house filled up with a disgusting mold that agitated his asthma so much that it sent him to the emergency room.
Volunteers eventually helped clean the place up somewhat and got Saman a mattress. But on Sunday the wood-burning stove he had been using for heat caught fire.
Melting materials in the ceiling burned his cheek. A neighbor who dashed into the house to look for Saman also suffered burns. The interior of the house — what was left of it after the flood — was destroyed.
Two days later, another fire broke out in a flood-damaged house across the street, also occupied by a resident trying to keep warm without a working furnace.
Asked why he hadn’t sought lodging elsewhere, Saman said he didn’t have family in the region and was rattled by the one night he spent in an emergency shelter. He said it seemed more populated by homeless drug addicts than displaced families.
“That place was not for me,” he said.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency offered to pay for a hotel, but Saman said he stopped looking because every inn within 100 miles of the city seemed to be booked solid through December.
Saman’s case may be extreme, but experts said it isn’t unusual for people to hurry back to homes not ready for habitation.
After Hurricane Katrina, medical researchers in New Orleans documented a rise in respiratory ailments among people living in neighborhoods where buildings were being repaired.
The issue wasn’t just mold, which can cause problems for years if it isn’t mediated properly, said Felicia Rabito, an epidemiologist at Tulane University’s School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. There was simply so much work being done, families spent their days breathing the fine particles of sanded wood and drywall.
People complained of something that became known as the “Katrina cough,” and while it subsided once the dust settled, researchers later found high lead levels in some neighborhoods due to work crews ignoring standards for lead paint removal.
A group of occupational health experts in New York City, including doctors who run programs for people sickened by World Trade Center dust after 9/11, warned last week that workers cleaning up Sandy’s wreckage need to protect themselves by suppressing dust with water, wearing masks and being aware of potential asbestos exposure.
“There are clearly sites that you don’t want children at … and it is very challenging for homeowners to know whether it is safe to go home,” said Dr. Maida Galvez, a pediatrician and environmental health expert at The Mount Sinai Hospital who is part of a team evaluating hazards in the disaster zone.
U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler has urged FEMA and the Environmental Protection Agency to develop a testing program that could give residents an indication of whether their homes were free of mold, sewage and other hazardous substances.
Farley, New York City’s health commissioner, said people entering rooms contaminated by floodwater should wear rubber boots and gloves, and exercise care in cleanup. The hazard posed by spilled sewage is a short-term one and experts say the disease-causing bacteria found in it can be wiped out with a good cleaning. But they say anything absorbent that touched tainted water, like curtains or rugs, should be thrown out.
As for the bitter cold, there was no test needed to tell John Frawley that his home is no place to be spending frigid autumn nights.
“A couple of days ago, I was shivering so badly, I just couldn’t stop,” he said.
Yet with winter nearly here, he still had no plan for getting his heat working again or his ruined electrical system restored, although he also has passed up some of the programs designed to help people like him.
And he has no intention of heading to a shelter.
Health News Headlines – Yahoo! News
Obama accuses House GOP of holding middle class tax cuts 'hostage'
Label: Business
President Obama is urging Congress to extend tax breaks for the middle class, saying it's "unacceptable for some Republicans in Congress to hold middle class tax cuts hostage simply because they refuse to let tax rates go up on the wealthiest Americans."
With the clock ticking toward the so-called "fiscal cliff," Obama asked lawmakers in his weekly address to "begin by doing what we all agree on" and extend the middle class tax cuts set to expire at the end of the year.
Read: Cliff Dive: A Stalemate and a Scrooge Christmas
"With the issue behind us, we'll have more time to work out a plan to bring down our deficits in a balanced way, including by asking the wealthiest Americans to pay a little more, so we can still invest in the things that make our nation strong," he said from a toy manufacturing facility in Hatfield, Pa., where he delivered a similar message to workers Friday.
The president has launched a public campaign to try and force Republicans to sign on to his position on the expiring Bush tax cuts, asking them to pass a Senate bill that would maintain low middle class tax rates while allowing them to go up on the top income earners.
"If we can just get a few House Republicans on board, I'll sign this bill as soon as Congress sends it my way," he said.
Read: Could Outgoing Republicans Hold Keys to 'Fiscal Cliff'?
Earlier this week, the White House put forth a deficit reduction proposal to avert the looming tax increases and spending cuts set to kick in on Jan. 1, which included $1.6 trillion in tax increases over the next 10 years, $50 billion in new stimulus spending, $400 billion in unspecified Medicare cuts, and a measure to effectively end Congress's ability to vote on the debt limit. The offer, which closely mirrors the president's previous deficit-reduction plans, lacked concessions to Republicans, including detailed spending cuts, and was strongly rejected.
Since then, as House Speaker John Boehner put it, negotiations between the White House and House Republicans have come to a "stalemate."
Also Read
Obama accuses House GOP of holding middle class tax cuts 'hostage'
Label: Business
President Obama is urging Congress to extend tax breaks for the middle class, saying it's "unacceptable for some Republicans in Congress to hold middle class tax cuts hostage simply because they refuse to let tax rates go up on the wealthiest Americans."
With the clock ticking toward the so-called "fiscal cliff," Obama asked lawmakers in his weekly address to "begin by doing what we all agree on" and extend the middle class tax cuts set to expire at the end of the year.
Read: Cliff Dive: A Stalemate and a Scrooge Christmas
"With the issue behind us, we'll have more time to work out a plan to bring down our deficits in a balanced way, including by asking the wealthiest Americans to pay a little more, so we can still invest in the things that make our nation strong," he said from a toy manufacturing facility in Hatfield, Pa., where he delivered a similar message to workers Friday.
The president has launched a public campaign to try and force Republicans to sign on to his position on the expiring Bush tax cuts, asking them to pass a Senate bill that would maintain low middle class tax rates while allowing them to go up on the top income earners.
"If we can just get a few House Republicans on board, I'll sign this bill as soon as Congress sends it my way," he said.
Read: Could Outgoing Republicans Hold Keys to 'Fiscal Cliff'?
Earlier this week, the White House put forth a deficit reduction proposal to avert the looming tax increases and spending cuts set to kick in on Jan. 1, which included $1.6 trillion in tax increases over the next 10 years, $50 billion in new stimulus spending, $400 billion in unspecified Medicare cuts, and a measure to effectively end Congress's ability to vote on the debt limit. The offer, which closely mirrors the president's previous deficit-reduction plans, lacked concessions to Republicans, including detailed spending cuts, and was strongly rejected.
Since then, as House Speaker John Boehner put it, negotiations between the White House and House Republicans have come to a "stalemate."
Also Read
The Kids Are All Right: How Social Media Created a Generation of Activists
Label: TechnologyThis week marked the nation’s inaugural “Giving Tuesday,” a UN sponsored initiative, which utilized social media to encourage businesses, schools, and community members to give back. The effort resulted in $ 10 million worth of donations made in a single day, a 53 percent increase over the same day last year.
Conceived as a means to promote activism and charity, the campaign’s use of social media to spread its message is most likely a large part of the initiative’s success.
Certainly people from every age group use Twitter and Facebook, but social media activism is especially resonant with young adults. According to TBWA, people between the ages of 18-29 strongly identify as activists and count social media as their first point of engagement when they learn about a new cause.
MORE: ‘Tis Always the Season to Give: Creating a Corporate Culture That Gives Back
In fact, about half believe that activism is important to their personal identity and about a third look to it as a means of socializing and relating to one another.
But more than identifying with activism, this younger generation’s aptitude for social media can effect real change. Look at the Susan G. Komen Foundation. Earlier this year, when the organization announced it would pull its funding for breast cancer screenings from Planned Parenthood, cutting off medical access for millions of women, Twitter and Facebook lit up with vitriolic statements, claiming the organization had become a puppet of the religious right. The ensuing bad press proved to be too much and within days, the organization reversed its decision and issued a public apology.
Similarly, when Florida law enforcement officials refused to arrest George Zimmerman after he fatally shot Trayvon Martin, the case lay dormant for almost a month. But an online petition started by Martin’s parents went viral and galvanized a nation demanding justice for the boy’s death. Zimmerman was arrested and charged as a result.
For all we hear about “kids these days” and their irresponsible use of social media−posting questionable pictures of themselves doing kegstands or letting Twitter corrode their ability to hold a thought for more than a nanosecond−it turns out that most are using it to express a genuine passion for changing the world around them. And they’re succeeding.
And these trends extend well beyond the U.S. That same age group in other countries shows similar interests in contributing to larger causes. China’s young adults for instance, lead the world in online political discussions and offline they donate the most money to charities. India’s younger generation ranks the first in the world when it comes to staying informed, and they’re the most optimistic about the impact their activism has on the world around them.
It seems that our youngest generation of adults are the ones leading the charge when it comes to effectively making a difference.
Do you consider yourself an activist? Let us know in the Comments what social causes inspire you to get involved.
Related Stories on TakePart:
• Secret Santas: Profiles in Anonymous Holiday Generosity
• Rwanda Genocide Survivor Wins Grant for Giving Back
• 40 U.S. Billionaires Pledge Half of Fortunes to Charity
A Bay Area native, Andri Antoniades previously worked as a fashion industry journalist and medical writer. In addition to reporting the weekend news on TakePart, she volunteers as a webeditor for locally-based nonprofits and works as a freelance feature writer for TimeOutLA.com. Email Andri | @andritweets | TakePart.com
Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News
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