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Reported Ukraine Fatalities Increase To 155

Recombinomics
Mon, 09 Nov 2009 20:13 EST

969,247 Influenza/ARI

48,972 Hospitalized

155 Dead

The above numbers represent the latest figures from Ukraine. The increases over the weekend have slowed, but it is unclear if this reduction in the rate of increases is due to an improving situation, or just fewer reports received because of the weekend. Although Lviv still has a wide lead in all categories (see map), including 155,895 cases, the city of Kiev is now up to 60,366 and when combined with the 47,802 cases in the Kiev Oblast, the Kiev city/oblast has increased to more than 100,000 cases, which is higher than any oblast, other than Lviv. The low number of deaths there, 5, may just be a trailing number, since the largest increases in Kiev were in the past few days.

Poland is now reporting schools with high absenteeism, although media reports and government comments continue to cite contributions from seasonal flu, even though all countries in Europe are reporting seasonal flu levels at less that 1% of flu positives. Worldwide, seasonal H1N1 has been crowded out, and low levels of H3N2 in eastern Asia are rapidly declining, suggesting the H1N1 swine flu will be the dominant influenza A in humans for years or decades.

Interpol
Fri, 13 Nov 2009 19:57 EST

In September 2009, senior law enforcement officials, health care professionals and experts from international organizations joined their forces to confront a chilling crisis - the plague had just been unleashed on their countries by unknown evildoers.

A fictional scenario with a serious aim

Fortunately, this terrifying situation was a scenario under control, and the civilian authorities were all participants in a Tabletop Exercise on Preventing Bioterrorism hosted by INTERPOL. This exercise simulated a global bioterrorism attack and its aftermath. Participants in the Black Death scenario were faced with a fictional, intentional plague attack involving countries from their region, with the exercise designed to assist them in identifying critical co-operation and co-ordination issues which could hinder a quick and successful response to such an attack in real life.

The Flu Case
Sat, 07 Nov 2009 18:38 EST

In an article today in Expressen a Swedish woman tells her story about how she got the "swine flu". That would have been ordinary but in her case she was vaccinated against it five days earlier. In the article it is implied that she got the flu from someone else and that her vaccination did not "take effect" for another several days.

In reality it seems to be a typical case of someone who actually got the flu from the shot. This is a well known and well documented phenomena with many types of vaccinations.

She had no symptoms for several days but the cough and in the night "it felt like I had a thousand warriors in my body". She went to the emergency reception at the local hospital and was kept there for three days. They gave her anti viral drug Tamiflu.

This Is Surrey Today
Fri, 13 Nov 2009 10:45 EST

A former soldier who handed a discarded shotgun in to police faces at least five years imprisonment for "doing his duty".

Paul Clarke, 27, was found guilty of possessing a firearm at Guildford Crown Court on Tuesday - after finding the gun and handing it personally to police officers on March 20 this year.

The jury took 20 minutes to make its conviction, and Mr Clarke now faces a minimum of five year's imprisonment for handing in the weapon.

In a statement read out in court, Mr Clarke said: "I didn't think for one moment I would be arrested.

"I thought it was my duty to hand it in and get it off the streets."

The court heard how Mr Clarke was on the balcony of his home in Nailsworth Crescent, Merstham, when he spotted a black bin liner at the bottom of his garden.

PressTV
Fri, 13 Nov 2009 10:51 EST

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has criticized the country's raw-material based economy and urged a speedy modernization of the 'whole' system.

Medvedev scolded the Soviet era economic and governance policies and pledged to overhaul the country's political and financial institutions which, he stated, have been built on a primitive infrastructure.

The Russian leader who was delivering his annual state of the union address before the country's economic and political elite at the presidential palace at the Kremlin on Thursday, pledged to fight corruption, deal with "unprincipled" officers in law enforcement and called for a change in the country's foreign policy agenda.

He also hinted at the possibility of liberalism without resorting to chaos and instability in Russia's polity, noting, "Instead of the archaic society, in which the leaders think and make decisions for everyone, we will be a country of intelligent, free and responsible people."

RIA Novosti
Fri, 13 Nov 2009 03:32 EST

A 25-year old man was killed, dismembered, eaten and parts of his body sold to a nearby fast-food stand in the Perm region of the Russian Urals, criminal investigators have reported.

According to the official site of the local Investigative Committee of the Prosecutor's office, three homeless men killed the victim out of "personal enmity."

"They stabbed him several times with a knife and a hit him with a hammer. The victim died at the scene of the crime," the site reports.

Steve Doughty
Mail Online
Tue, 10 Nov 2009 10:53 EST

More than 100 rapists have been let off with a police caution, it was revealed yesterday. The 111 cases included 66 incidents of child rape.

The extent to which police forces have handed cautions to rapists, whose crime carries a maximum sentence of life in jail, was made public as Justice Secretary Jack Straw announced a full-scale review of the system of punishing crime with cautions and on-the-spot fines.

Mr Straw acted after a weekend when senior police chiefs and the Director of Public Prosecutions Keir Starmer QC called for curbs on the use of out-of-court punishments.

Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson also condemned the 'uncontrollable increase in cautions' and said that on-the-spot fines, now often used to punish offences such as shoplifting, 'in the public's minds equate to a parking ticket.'

Berlusconi changing the law again

Nick Squires
Telegraph.co.uk
Fri, 13 Nov 2009 10:26 EST

Silvio Berlusconi came under fire on Tuesday for a controversial proposal to reduce the length of time trials can last, in a move condemned by his critics as a way for him to eliminate at a stroke his own legal entanglements.

The prime minister's most important ally, faction leader Gianfranco Fini, said a bill would be introduced to parliament which would propose capping the length of Italian trials, which can currently last more than a decade.

The Italian justice system is in desperate need of reform - official figures show that there is a backlog of 3.6 million criminal cases and 5.4 million civil cases.

But there is little doubt that the proposal to change the country's statute of limitations would also benefit Mr Berlusconi, 73, who faces two corruption trials which are due to start this month.

An MP from the opposition Democratic Party, Donatella Ferranti, said parliament should reject any "tailor-made laws" designed to let Mr Berlusconi off the hook.

Antonio Di Pietro, a former anti-corruption investigator and the leader of the small Italy of Values opposition party, described the proposed changes as "criminal". A colleague, Felice Belisario, said: "This is just a masked trick to save the prime minister."

Larry Elliott
Guardian.co.uk
Tue, 10 Nov 2009 09:55 EST

The head of Britain's climate change watchdog predicted today that households will need to spend up to £15,000 on a full energy efficiency makeover if the government is to meet its ambitious targets for cutting carbon emissions.

Warning that Britain needs to step up its efforts to reduce greenhouse gases after picking all the "low-hanging fruit", Adair Turner said radical steps would be needed for electricity generation, cars and homes.

Amid growing concern that next month's Copenhagen climate change summit could end in bitter failure, the chairman of the government's climate change commission warned against using the drop in emissions caused by the longest recession since the 1930s as an excuse to relax in the fight against climate change.

Andrew Porter & Louise Gray
Telegraph.co.uk
Tue, 10 Nov 2009 10:02 EST

A total of 10 new nuclear power stations will be built that could supply up to 25 per cent of the country's power needs.

Ed Miliband, the Energy and Climate Change Secretary, announced the expansion of Britain's nuclear power capability yesterday in the face of opposition from environmentalists and concern from consumer groups, who warned fuel bills could rise to pay for building programme.

Comment: Meanwhile his brother the foreign secretary does everything to block Iran's plans for nuclear energy.

The Conservatives attacked the plans for being "10 years too late."

Mr Miliband told MPs that the first new power plant should be operational by 2018. They will be built on the sites of old nuclear power stations or those soon to be decommissioned and the Government hopes it could mean that by 2025, nuclear will generate a quarter of the country's electricity - compared to 13 per cent now. Environmentalists however, claim this is optimistic and the new nuclear power stations will generate considerably less power than the Government hopes.

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