Society's ChildS


Syringe

French lab shut after losing SARS virus samples

SARS Virus
© BBC News

Paris - French medical authorities have ordered a prestigious laboratory to suspend its activities after it lost more than 2,000 test tubes containing the SARS respiratory virus.

The Pasteur Institute reported the tubes missing last month from one of its labs, but insisted in a statement that the tubes do not pose any infection risk.

The institute asked the ANSM medical safety agency to carry out inspections at the lab.

ANSM chief inspector Gaetan Rudant said Tuesday that its inspectors did not find the tubes but did find "dysfunction" in the way the lab tracked its material.

The ANSM ordered the lab's activities suspended and a "tube-by-tube" inventory of all material at the Pasteur Institute.

SARS, or Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, infected about 8,000 people in 2003, killing nearly 800.

Source: Associated Press

Dollars

Fractional reserve banking - how it works and what's ahead

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© Unknown
From Chapter 15 of The Money Bubble, by James Turk and John Rubino:

Banking didn't start out as a reckless, parasitical plaything of a moneyed and politically-connected aristocracy. In the beginning, in fact, bankers weren't even bankers. They were jewelers and goldsmiths who had to maintain their inventory with vaults, guards etc., and offered storage services to others with valuables to protect. So the original banks were, in effect, very safe warehouses.

Eventually some goldsmiths noticed that the paper receipts they gave to their customers to evidence the valuables left in storage began to circulate as currency alongside their countries' coins. A shopkeeper accepting these receipts in payment knew that he could go to the goldsmith to redeem them for gold and silver, and also recognized that a paper receipt was more convenient to use as currency than were pieces of metal. Gradually these receipts became a widely-accepted form of payment, circulating among buyers to sellers and saved like other forms of wealth.

The goldsmiths then noticed something else about their new paper-money invention: Only a tiny fraction of their clients asked for the return of their valuables in any given period, which led to a bright - but legally and morally-dubious - idea. Why not start issuing receipts in excess of the gold and silver on hand? The goldsmiths could spend this currency themselves or lend it to others - thus inventing the business/consumer loan. Henceforth the total gold and silver in the vault (the goldsmith's reserves) would equal only a fraction of the receipts circulating as currency.

Comment: Thus the need to prepare for economic disaster is important for everyone.


Arrow Down

Police confiscate Indiana man's bodily fluids using forced catheterization

Exam Gloves
© Esteem® exam gloves

Schererville - A federal lawsuit alleges that police officers forged the results of a breath alcohol test and then forcibly penetrated a man's body with a catheter to extract his bodily fluids.

William B. Clark, 23, gave a disturbing account detailing official police misconduct and invasive, forced medical procedures.

Clark, of Crown Point, was pulled over on the evening of May 20, 2012, while driving on U.S. 30 near its intersection with U.S. 41, on suspicion of driving under the influence.

Schererville Police Officer Matthew Djukic initiated the traffic stop, and Officer Damian Murks responded in a separate vehicle. Mr. Clark was asked to perform a Breathalyzer test, which he did.

The suit alleges that the results of the breath test were falsely reported to create a pretext to arrest Clark. The legal limit in Indiana is 0.08 BAC, police claimed Clark's was 0.11 BAC. While on the scene, Officer Djukic searched the interior of Clark's car with a canine, a process Clark says was done illegally.

Mr. Clark was then taken to the St. Margaret Mercy Hospital in nearby Dyer, Indiana. Clark submitted to a blood test, the lawsuit states, which showed that his BAC only 0.073 - below the legal limit. The blood test is the most accurate method to measure blood-alcohol content.

Handcuffs

Rabbi, cop, nurse among 70 arrested in child porn bust

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New York City Police and federal authorities have arrested at least 70 people in what's being billed as one of the largest online child pornography busts ever.

According to the Associated Press, among those arrested are a rabbi, a Boy Scout leader, a little league baseball coach, a nurse, and a police officer, with most the arrests originating in the New York City area. In addition to charging dozens of men with exploting and photographing children, one New Jersey woman was also detained for allegedly using Skype to place her child in "compromising positions."

Dollar

Best of the Web: 27 huge red flags for the U.S. economy

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If you believe that the U.S. economy is heading in the right direction, you really need to read this article. As we look toward the second half of 2014, there are economic red flags all over the place. Industrial production is down. Home sales are way down. Retail stores are closing at the fastest pace since the collapse of Lehman Brothers. U.S. household debt is up substantially, and in 20 percent of all U.S. families everyone is unemployed.

In so many ways, what we are witnessing right now is so similar to what we experienced during the build up to the last great financial crisis. We are making so many of the very same mistakes that we made the last time, and yet our "leaders" seem completely oblivious to what is happening. But the warning signs are very clear. All you have to do is open your eyes and look at them. The following are 27 huge red flags for the U.S. economy...

#1 Despite endless assurances from the Obama administration that we are in an "economic recovery", the number one concern for U.S. voters is "Unemployment/Jobs" according to a recent Gallup survey.

Comment: Economic collapse is inevitable, and it's going to hit the U.S. hardest. So says last week's guest on SOTT Talk Radio, Dmitry Orlov.


Passport

Russia to ban citizenship change for adopted children

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Russian MPs intend to ban changing of citizenship of adopted Russian kids over fears that NGOs specializing in adoptions might send children to the United States via third countries.

"Despite the fact that we are no longer sending orphans for adoption to US families, the USA has not given up on its policy of purchases of children. If we fail to impose a legal ban on the shipping of children across the ocean, they will transport them through third countries," State Duma deputy Yevgeniy Fyodorov (United Russia) has told the mass circulation daily, Izvestia.

Handcuffs

Murder, grifting mastermind Sante Kimes dead in prison at 79

Kimes, who involved son Kenneth in her devious plots, passed away Monday evening about 7:30 p.m., according to a New York state Corrections Department spokeswoman. She was convicted for murdering Upper East Side widow Irene Silverman and a Los Angeles businessman.

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© Ric Francis/Associated PressConvicted murderer Sante Kimes is shown in court in 2004 awaiting the guilty verdict in her trial for the murder of Los Angeles businessman David Kazdin. She died Monday in a New York prison.
Sante Kimes, the mastermind of a murderous mother-son grifter team in which he killed on her command, has died of natural causes at the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility.

The conniving Kimes, 79, passed away Monday evening about 7:30 p.m. in the suburban New York prison's maximum security unit, state Corrections Department spokeswoman Linda Foglia said.

Kimes was serving out a life sentence plus 125 years for a pair of grisly murders - one on each coast - that turned the prostitute's daughter into a made-for-television villain.

No less a star than Mary Tyler Moore portrayed the cold-blooded Kimes in one of two small screen biopics based on her bicoastal killings.

In New York, Kimes was convicted for the murder of wealthy Upper East Side widow Irene Silverman in a plot to steal her $7.5 million townhouse.

Alarm Clock

Chicago police caught on video brutally abusing woman


A recent lawsuit filed against Chicago police shows a woman was physically and verbally abused by the US city's police officers last year.

Jianqing "Jessica" Klyzek, 32-year-old manager of a tanning salon and massage parlor, was subject to police brutality last year as the officers tried to place her under arrest, according to the lawsuit which was filed on May 14.

Info

10 ways to survive skyrocketing food prices

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Food prices are getting out of control. As meats, dairy, and eggs climb to record high prices and over 50 million Americans are now on public food assistance, family budgets are being stretched like never before just to survive.

Yet official statistics say Americans only spend about 11% of their post-tax income on food. I don't know about you, but food is my family's biggest monthly expense no matter what percentage of my income it is. I suspect that the same goes for most households reading this.

The causes for higher prices are many: currency inflation, fuel costs, bad weather, commodity speculation, higher demand, etc. I refer to the causes only to illustrate that this trend is very likely to continue. Therefore, it is wise to manage this crucial household expense more closely.

2 + 2 = 4

What makes Ohio State the most unequal public university in America?

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© Courtesy of Bob Hall, CC 3.0The Ohio State University library
"Congratulations, Class of 2014, you're totally screwed" - that was the graduation message offered this season by Thomas Frank, Salon columnist and author of Pity the Billionaire. The average student-loan borrower graduating in 2014 is $33,000 in debt, according to the Wall Street Journal - the highest amount ever. And a new study of public universities shows that student debt is worst at schools with the highest-paid presidents.

The "most unequal" public university in America, according to the report, is Ohio State. Between 2010 and 2012 it paid its president, Gordon Gee, a total of almost $6 million, while raising tuition and fees so much that student debt grew 23 percent faster than the national average.