With Christie, Obama vows, ‘We will not quit until this is done’

President Barack Obama hugs North Point Marina owner Donna Vanzant as he tours the damage in Brigantine, N.J. At …Just six days before the election, President Barack Obama toured storm-ravaged areas with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. He told Garden State residents struggling in the superstorm's aftermath that all of America shares their pain—and their government is there to help.

"The main message I wanted to send is the entire country has been watching what's been happening," Obama said Wednesday during a visit to the Brigantine Beach Community Center. "Everybody knows how hard Jersey's been hit."

("Except my boss," shouted Michael Henshaw, 32, a Brigantine resident who works at an insurance company. "Well, except your boss. If you need me to call, you let me know," Obama replied, drawing laughter from the room. That exchange, and many of the details in this post, are from pool reporter Reid Epstein of Politico.)

The White House told reporters that during the worst of the storm's devastation 200 people were sleeping in the center's gym, though that number has dropped to 50. The center still serves as a spot for people to get meals and take hot showers.

Obama traveled to New Jersey, which bore the brunt of the storm's wrath, with Federal Emergency Management Agency chief Craig Fugate. The president and Christie—an outspoken Mitt Romney backer—traded praise over the response to the devastating storm.

"I want to just let you know that your governor is working overtime to make sure that as soon as possible everybody can get back to normal," said Obama. "We are going to be here for the long haul. We're going to not tolerate any red tape. We're not going to tolerate any bureaucracy."

Christie, wearing a blue polar fleece jacket with "CHRIS CHRISTIE GOVERNOR" in white letters over his heart, echoed Obama's message.

"I just want to tell all of you exactly what the president just said. I know he means it," Christie said. "I want to thank the president for coming here today. It's really important to have the president of the United States acknowledge all the suffering that's going on here in New Jersey, and I appreciate it very much. We're going to work together to make sure we get ourselves through this crisis and get everything back to normal. Thank you for coming, sir."President Barack Obama and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP)

Aides say the president is focused on doing his job, not on the election, but the governor's praise and the seemingly smooth federal response to the storm could help him in his neck-and-neck race with Romney.

Obama and Christie took an aerial tour of some of the destruction aboard the president's Marine One helicopter before the visit to Brigantine.

In brief public remarks afterward, the governor had said of the president, "He has sprung into action immediately to help. He has worked incredibly closely with me since before the storm hit.

"It's been a great working relationship to make sure that we're doing the jobs that people elected us to do, and I cannot thank the president enough for his personal concern and compassion for our state and the people of our state."

(He also joked about those who ignored his "admonition to get the hell out of here. You are forgiven this time, but not for much longer.")

Obama returned the praise, saying Christie had been "responsive" and "aggressive" even before "this incredible storm. ... The people of New Jersey recognize that he has put his heart and soul into making sure that the people of New Jersey bounce back even stronger than before. So I just want to thank him for his extraordinary leadership and partnership."

The president added that "because of some good preparation, the loss of life was kept lower than it might have been."

He then offered his "thoughts and prayers" to those who lost loved ones. "I speak for the whole country," he said.

Both men cited the urgent need to restore power to the vast areas that lost it during the storm.

Obama, who canceled campaign events on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday to take charge of the federal response, said he had instituted a "15-minute rule" for returning telephone calls from governors and mayors. "If they need something, we'll figure out a way to say 'yes,'" the president said.

"We will not quit until this is done," he promised.

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Hurricane Sandy disrupts Northeast U.S. telecom networks

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Power outages and flooding caused by Hurricane Sandy disrupted telecommunications services in Northeastern states on Tuesday, resulting in spotty coverage for cellphones, television, home telephones and Internet services.

While all the region's telecom service providers were having problems, Verizon Communications, which serves many of the states in the hurricane's path, may have suffered some of the worst damage from the storm to its wireline network.

About 25 percent of the region's wireless cell towers were out of action after the storm and some 911 emergency call centers were not working, according to Julius Genachowski, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission.

"Our assumption is that communications outages could get worse before they get better," Genachowski told reporters on a conference call, noting that the storm had not ended.

Also power outages could disrupt more cell sites if they run out of back-up power before commercial electricity services are up and running again.

People lined up at pay-phones in at least one New York neighborhood, the Lower East Side, today as their phones had either lost coverage or they had run out of battery power because there was nowhere to charge their phones in the neighborhood which had lost commercial power.

New York-based Verizon said the storm caused flooding at three Verizon central offices that hold telecom equipment in Lower Manhattan as well as sites in Queens and Long Island.

Its downtown headquarters, which was put out of action 11 years ago by the September 11 attacks, had three feet of water in the lobby at one point. Because of flooding, all its telecom equipment at that office, which serves much of Wall Street and downtown consumers, was knocked out of service.

The company said it was working on pumping out the water in the hope that it could restart its back-up power generators in the facility as commercial power services were not yet restored the morning after the big storm hit.

"The bullseye of the impact is the metro area," said spokesman William Kula, adding that restoring service for the city's financial district was a top priority for Verizon.

Telecom disruptions affect electronic trading as well as corporate operators. The chief operating officer of the New York Stock Exchange, which is expected to open Wednesday, said "lots of telecom infrastructure is down" and that the NYSE was working with big firms to ensure they were doing testing of their systems.

Verizon did not give an estimate as to how many businesses and consumers were affected. Two of three Manhattan central offices were partially flooded and operating minimal services.

Customers served by the damaged central offices will experience "a loss of all services" including TV, Internet, and traditional telephone services, Kula said. Some customers may experience intermittent busy signals for non-emergency calls.

Verizon said its engineers were working on assessing the damage from the early hours. Outside of New York, the company warned that it was also having some trouble.

"Verizon is discovering that many poles and power lines/Verizon cables are down throughout the region due to heavy winds and falling trees," the company said in a statement.

Verizon Wireless, AT&T Inc, Sprint Nextel, and T-Mobile USA said they were dealing with wireless service problems in the hurricane region. Cable operators Cablevision Systems Corp, Comcast Corp and Time Warner Cable also said they were having service problems.

"I think everybody's equipment's going to be damaged, including cellphone towers," Stifel Nicolaus analyst Christopher King said from his Verizon Wireless cellphone in Baltimore.

"Particularly for Verizon, they're clearly going to have the most damage on the wireline side because its pretty much all of their territory (where the storm hit)," King said.

Sprint Nextel, the No. 3 U.S. mobile provider said it was seeing outages at some cell sites because of the power outages across all the states in Sandy's path including New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Washington DC, Maryland, North Virginia and New England.

"(Repair crews) have started on some critical areas but they haven't been able to get to everywhere they need to be," spokeswoman Crystal Davis said. She noted that 80 of the company's stores would reopen at noon. Sprint had closed about 180 stores ahead of the storm.

T-Mobile USA said that "customers may be experiencing service disruptions or an inability to access service in some areas, especially those that were hardest hit by the storm."

People complained of outages to their cable telephone, Internet and television services from providers including Comcast, Cablevision and Verizon in New Jersey, Connecticut, and New York.

Cablevision said it was experiencing widespread service interruptions primarily related to loss of power. The company said it is working to restore services.

Comcast, whose headquarters is in Philadelphia and serves East Coast states, said that for the majority of customers, "Comcast service should be restored as power comes back on to their homes."

Cellphone service was spotty for top wireless providers Verizon Wireless, AT&T Inc and T-Mobile USA, a unit of Deutsche Telekom, according to some customers.

Verizon Wireless, a venture of Verizon Communications and Vodafone Group, said on Tuesday afternoon that customers may be experiencing service issues and that about 94 percent of its cell sites were up and running.

AT&T said it was experiencing some issues in areas heavily affected by the storm. By Tuesday morning, spokesman Mark Siegel said AT&T was in the initial stages of on-the-ground assessment and that it expected "crews will be working around the clock to restore service."

Several Time Warner Cable customers in Brooklyn said that their Internet, television and phone services stopped working Monday night but were back again by Tuesday morning.

Time Warner Cable said that while it has not seen any major damage to its infrastructure, its customers who do not have electricity do not have cable services.

Millions of people in the eastern United States awoke on Tuesday to flooded homes, fallen trees and widespread power outages caused by Sandy, which swamped New York City's subway system and submerged streets in Manhattan's financial district.

At least 30 people were reported killed in the United States by one of the biggest storms to ever hit the country. Sandy dropped just below hurricane status before making landfall on Monday night in New Jersey.

(Additional reporting by Jennifer Saba, Liana Baker, Katya Wachtel in New York, Dian Bartz in Washington DC and many other Reuters reporters around the hurricane region; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Andrea Ricci)

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Disney to make new ‘Star Wars’ films, buy Lucas co

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A decade after George Lucas said “Star Wars” was finished on the big screen, a new trilogy is destined for theaters after The Walt Disney Co. announced Tuesday that it was buying Lucasfilm Ltd. for $ 4.05 billion.

The seventh movie, with a working title of “Episode 7,” is set for release in 2015. Episodes 8 and 9 will follow. The new trilogy will carry the story of Luke Skywalker, Han Solo and Princess Leia beyond “Return of the Jedi,” the third film released and the sixth in the saga. After that, Disney plans a new “Star Wars” movie every two or three years. Lucas will serve as creative consultant in the new movies.

“For the past 35 years, one of my greatest pleasures has been to see Star Wars passed from one generation to the next,” said Lucas, chairman and CEO of Lucasfilm Ltd. “It’s now time for me to pass Star Wars on to a new generation of filmmakers. I’ve always believed that Star Wars could live beyond me, and I thought it was important to set up the transition during my lifetime.”

Disney CEO Bob Iger said Lucusfilm had already developed an extensive story line on the next trilogy, and Episode 7 was now in early-stage development.

The Walt Disney Co. announced the blockbuster agreement to buy Lucasfilm in cash and stock Tuesday. The deal includes Lucasfilm’s prized high-tech production companies, Industrial Light & Magic and Skywalker Sound, as well as rights to the “Indiana Jones” franchise.

Iger said in a statement that the acquisition is a great fit and will help preserve and grow the “Star Wars” franchise.

“The last ‘Star Wars’ movie release was 2005′s ‘Revenge of the Sith’ — and we believe there’s substantial pent-up demand,” Iger said.

Kathleen Kennedy, the current co-chairman of Lucasfilm, will become the division’s president and report to Walt Disney Studios Chairman Alan Horn.

The deal brings Lucasfilm under the Disney banner with other brands including Pixar, Marvel, ESPN and ABC, all companies that Disney has acquired over the years. A former weatherman who rose through the ranks of ABC, Iger has orchestrated some of the company’s biggest acquisitions, including the $ 7.4 billion purchase of animated movie studio Pixar in 2006 and the $ 4.2 billion acquisition of comic book giant Marvel in 2009.

Disney shares were not trading with stock markets closed due to the impact of Superstorm Sandy in New York.

Entertainment News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Compounding Pharmacies Feeling the Effects of NECC’s Errors

Closing the barn door after the horse has escaped doesn’t help those it might encounter, but it does protect people from the many other horses that remain in the barn. This is analogous to what’s going on with compounding pharmacies in Florida and Massachusetts, now that the unsanitary conditions of the New England Compounding Center , NECC, have been linked to the current fungal meningitis outbreak.

Massachusetts Takes Action Against Compounding Pharmacies

The New York Times reported that after Massachusetts’ health officials performed surprise inspections at some of the compounding pharmacies located in the state, the Waltham, Massachusetts-based Infusion Resource voluntarily surrendered its license over the weekend. The license surrender followed an Oct. 23 inspection that found the environment in which medications were being made revealed sanitation issues and perhaps as importantly, this pharmacy had been administering intravenous medications to patients, a clear violation of their license.

Infusion Resource is the third compounding pharmacy in the state to have its license suspended.

Florida Takes Action Against Compounding Pharmacy

Rejuvi Pharmaceuticals was the first compounding pharmacy in Florida to have its operations suspended after an inspection of the facility by the Florida Department of Health, according to Reuters . State officials visited Rejuvi Pharmaceuticals on Oct. 26 as part of a routine inspection rotation and found a number of violations, ranging from cleanliness of areas related to medications to record keeping issues.

Role of Compounding Pharmacies

A compounding pharmacy’s main role is to make a drug or drugs as prescribed by a physician for a specific patient. These prescriptions may call for formulations or dosages of medications not available through the usual route from drug manufacturers.

As WebMD explained, perhaps a person is allergic to an ingredient in a manufactured medication. The compounding pharmacy would create the needed medication absent the allergy-causing ingredient. When a specific strength or dose is not available in manufactured medications, a compounding pharmacy is called upon to create what is necessary for that prescription, for that patient.

Where NECC Fell Short

In addition to the unsanitary conditions at NECC, in addition to the pharmacy violating its own regulations of awaiting test results on purity of product before that product is shipped, the NECC erred in manufacturing and distributing vials of medication that were not patient-specific in nature, such as the three lots of recalled methylprednisolone acetate linked to the fungal meningitis outbreak.

Bottom Line

No one is suggesting that compounding pharmacies shutter their doors, because the role their products play in health care is an important one. Compounding pharmacies have thus far escaped the same scrutiny and standards to which standard pharmaceutical companies are held. In Massachusetts, for instance, according to the Associated Press, a compounding pharmacy is inspected when it opens, if it moves, or if a complaint is received about it.

More inspections and improved regulations may prevent another public health dilemma, but improved vigilance will also cost more money. That may be the sore point with taxpayers/consumers.

Smack dab in the middle of the baby boomer generation, L.L. Woodard is a proud resident of “The Red Man” state. With what he hopes is an everyman’s view of life’s concerns both in his state and throughout the nation, Woodard presents facts and opinions based on common-sense solutions.

Health News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Sandy's death toll climbs; millions without power

NEW YORK (AP) — Millions of people from Maine to the Carolinas waited wearily for the power to come back on Tuesday, and New Yorkers found themselves all but cut off from the modern world as the U.S. death toll from Superstorm Sandy climbed to 40, many of the victims killed by falling trees.

The extent of the damage in New Jersey, where the storm roared ashore Monday night with hurricane-force winds of 80 mph, began coming into focus: homes knocked off their foundations, boardwalks wrecked and amusement pier rides cast into the sea.

"We are in the midst of urban search and rescue. Our teams are moving as fast as they can," Gov. Chris Christie said. "The devastation on the Jersey Shore is some of the worst we've ever seen. The cost of the storm is incalculable at this point."

As the storm steamed inland, still delivering punishing wind and rain, more than 8.2 million people across the East were without power. Airlines canceled more than 15,000 flights around the world, and it could be days before the mess is untangled and passengers can get where they're going.

The storm also disrupted the presidential campaign with just a week to go before Election Day.

President Barack Obama canceled a third straight day of campaigning, scratching events scheduled for Wednesday in swing state Ohio. Republican Mitt Romney resumed his campaign, but with plans to turn a political rally in Ohio into a "storm relief event."

Sandy will end up causing about $20 billion in property damage and $10 billion to $30 billion more in lost business, making it one of the costliest natural disasters on record in the U.S., according to IHS Global Insight, a forecasting firm.

Lower Manhattan, which includes Wall Street, was among the hardest-hit areas after the storm sent a nearly 14-foot surge of seawater, a record, coursing over its seawalls and highways.

Water cascaded into the gaping, unfinished construction pit at the World Trade Center, and the New York Stock Exchange was closed for a second day, the first time that has happened because of weather since the Blizzard of 1888. The NYSE said it will reopen on Wednesday.

A huge fire destroyed as many as 100 houses in a flooded beachfront neighborhood in Queens on Tuesday, forcing firefighters to undertake daring rescues. Three people were injured.

New York University's Tisch Hospital evacuated 200 patients after its backup generator failed. About 20 babies from the neonatal intensive care unit were carried down staircases and were given battery-powered respirators.

A construction crane that collapsed in the high winds on Monday still dangled precariously 74 floors above the streets of midtown Manhattan, and hundreds of people were evacuated as a precaution. And on Staten Island, a tanker ship wound up beached on the shore.

Some bridges into New York reopened, but some tunnels were closed, as were schools, Broadway theaters and the metropolitan area's three main airports, LaGuardia, Kennedy and Newark.

With water standing in two major commuter tunnels and seven subway tunnels under the East River, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said it was unclear when the nation's largest transit system would be rolling again. It shut down Sunday night ahead of the storm.

Joseph Lhota, chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, said the damage was the worst in the 108-year history of the New York subway.

Similarly, Consolidated Edison said it could take at least a week to restore electricity to the last of the nearly 800,000 customers in and around New York City who lost power.

Millions of more fortunate New Yorkers surveyed the damage as dawn broke, their city brought to an extraordinary standstill.

Photos: Superstorm Sandy wreaks havoc

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"Oh, Jesus. Oh, no," Faye Schwartz said she looked over her neighborhood in Brooklyn, where cars were scattered like leaves.

Reggie Thomas, a maintenance supervisor at a prison near the overflowing Hudson River, emerged from an overnight shift, a toothbrush in his front pocket, to find his Honda with its windows down and a foot of water inside. The windows automatically go down when the car is submerged to free drivers.

"It's totaled," Thomas said with a shrug. "You would have needed a boat last night."

Around midday, Sandy was about 120 miles east of Pittsburgh, pushing westward with winds of 45 mph, and was expected to make a turn into New York State on Tuesday night. Although weakening as it goes, the storm will continue to bring heavy rain and flooding, said Daniel Brown of the National Hurricane Center in Miami.

In a measure of the storm's immense size and power, waves on southern Lake Michigan rose to a record-tying 20.3 feet. High winds spinning off Sandy's edges clobbered the Cleveland area early Tuesday, uprooting trees, cutting power to hundreds of thousands, closing schools and flooding major roads along Lake Erie.

In Portland, Maine, gusts topping 60 mph scared away several cruise ships and prompted officials to close the port.

Sandy also brought blizzard conditions to parts of West Virginia and neighboring Appalachian states, with more than 2 feet of snow expected in some places. A snowstorm in western Maryland caused a pileup of tractor-trailers that blocked part of Interstate 68 on slippery Big Savage Mountain.

"It's like a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs up here," said Bill Wiltson, a Maryland State Police dispatcher.

The death toll climbed rapidly, and included 17 victims in New York State — 10 of them in New York City — along with five each in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Sandy also killed 69 people in the Caribbean before making its way up the Eastern Seaboard.

In New Jersey, Sandy cut off barrier islands and wrecked boardwalks up and down the coast, tearing away a section of Atlantic City's world-famous promenade. Atlantic City's 12 waterfront casinos came through largely unscathed.

Jersey City was closed to cars because traffic lights were out, and Hoboken, just over the Hudson River from Manhattan, was hit with major flooding.

A huge swell of water swept over the small New Jersey town of Moonachie, near the Hackensack River, and authorities struggled to rescue about 800 people, some living in a trailer park. And in neighboring Little Ferry, water suddenly started gushing out of storm drains overnight, submerging a road under 4 feet of water and swamping houses.

Police and fire officials used boats and trucks to reach the stranded.

"I looked out and the next thing you know, the water just came up through the grates. It came up so quickly you couldn't do anything about it. If you wanted to move your car to higher ground you didn't have enough time," said Little Ferry resident Leo Quigley, who with his wife was taken to higher ground by boat.

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Hays reported from New York and Breed reported from Raleigh, N.C.; AP Science Writer Seth Borenstein contributed to this report from Washington. Associated Press writers David Dishneau in Delaware City, Del., Katie Zezima in Atlantic City, Emery P. Dalesio in Elizabeth City, N.C., and Erika Niedowski in Cranston, R.I., also contributed.

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Pole gets 30 years for killing 6 on Channel Island

LONDON (AP) — A Polish builder who killed six people, including his wife and children, on the British Channel Island of Jersey has been sentenced to 30 years in prison.

Damian Rzeszowski, 31, carried out the knife attack in August 2011 at his home. He was said to have become depressed after his wife admitted to an affair.

Rzeszowski was convicted of six counts of manslaughter but cleared of murder. On Monday, Judge Michael Birt sentenced him to 30 years in jail for each victim, but the sentences are to run concurrently.

Rzeszowski’s victims were his wife Izabela Rzeszowska, 30; 5-year-old daughter, Kinga; 2-year-old son, Kacper; father-in-law, Marek Gartska, 56; his wife’s friend Marta De La Haye, 34; and her 5-year-old daughter, Julia.

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Apple software, retail chiefs out in sweeping overhaul

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Apple Inc Chief Executive Tim Cook on Monday replaced the heads of its software and retail units in the company's most sweeping executive shake-up in a decade following embarrassing problems with its new mapping program and unpopular store-related decisions.

Software chief Scott Forstall, who oversaw the launch of the flawed mapping software and much criticized Siri voice-enabled assistant, will leave Apple next year and serve as an advisor to Cook in the meantime.

Forstall, seen as a polarizing figure inside Apple, had been billed as one of the future candidates to take the top job at Apple. He was the executive behind the panned Apple Maps app that the company announced with much fanfare in summer.

The moves, which come a little more than a year into Cook's tenure as CEO, were described by Apple as a way to increase "collaboration" across its hardware, software and services business.

"These changes show that Tim Cook is stamping his authority on the business," Ben Wood, analyst with CCS Insight, said. "Perhaps disappointed with the Maps issues, Forstall became the scapegoat."

Critics of the maps debacle, which led Cook to apologize to customers, had been calling for Forstall's head. "Does Apple have a Scott Forstall problem?" Fortune editor Philip Elmer Dewitt wrote on Sept 29.

The moves hand over substantially more responsibility to Cue, the head of Internet Software and Services who helped create the iTunes music store and App Store. The 23-year Apple veteran already is in charge of Cloud services and will take on Apple Maps and Siri.

Apple said a search is underway for a new retail chief to replace John Browett and that the retail team would report directly to Cook. Browett had riled up the retail store staff when he decided to reduce the number of retail employees.

Browett took over as head of Apple's retail stores earlier this year, replacing Ron Johnson, who went on to become the CEO of JC Penney.

Last week Apple delivered a second straight quarter of disappointing financial results, and iPad sales fell short of Wall Street's targets, marring its record of consistently blowing past investors' expectations.

(Reporting by Alexei Oreskovic; Editing by Richard Chang)

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Anderson Cooper’s daytime show to end after two seasons

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Anderson Cooper‘s venture into daytime is coming to an end after just two seasons after failing to find an audience in the crowded daytime talk show market.

Warner Bros Television, which syndicates “Anderson”, said on Monday the show will not be renewed after the current season ends in the summer of 2013.

“The series will not be coming back for a third season in a marketplace that has become difficult to break through,” Warner Bros said in a statement.

The CNN anchor launched “Anderson,” subsequently retitled “Anderson Live,” in September 2011. But the show has struggled in the ratings despite retooling in the face of competition from veteran daytime hosts such as Ellen DeGeneres, and newcomers such as Katie Couric and “Survivor” host Jeff Probst.

“Anderson Live,” is attracting an average audience of about 1.4 million viewers, compared with around 4 million for “Dr. Phil” and about 2.3 million for “Katie,” according to TV ratings data.

Cooper issued a statement on Monday saying, “I am very proud of the work that our terrific staff has put into launching and sustaining our show for two seasons,” and added that he looked forward “to doing more great shows this season … I’m sorry that we won’t be continuing.”

TV stations carrying the show were first informed on Friday that the producers were not seeking renewal for another season.

Cooper, 45, and the winner of multiple Emmy award and a Peabody Award, continues as host of the CNN news program “Anderson Cooper 360” and has hosted the network’s New Year’s Eve special from Times Square for several years running.

Warner Bros is owned by Time Warner Inc.

(Reporting by Chris Michaud, editing by Jill Serjeant and Marguerita Choy)

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Slimmer future for heavy kids who get help early

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Weight-loss programs can help even very young children slim down, and it appears that acting early may improve the odds of success, according to a pair of new studies.

“What they are showing is a pretty consistent trend that if we were to intervene early, we could really have an effect on changing the trajectory of weight gain in children,” said Dr. Elsie Taveras, a pediatrician at Harvard Medical School and Boston Children’s Hospital, who co-wrote an editorial on the findings.

In one study, Dutch scientists found that heavy three- to five-year-olds saw continued benefits from a weight-loss intervention at least several months after it ended.

And a report from Sweden shows overweight and obese children under 10 were much more likely to slow their weight gain than were adolescents getting similar behavioral treatments.

The two studies were released Monday in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine.

Excessive pounds in childhood often stay on into adulthood, where they have been linked to heart disease, diabetes and other health problems.

Taveras said there is mounting evidence that paying attention to young kids may be a promising way to stem the global obesity epidemic. In 2008, more than a third of U.S. youths were either overweight or obese, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The numbers have also been on the rise in Europe, although they are still lower than in the U.S.

The Dutch researchers, led by Dr. Gianni Bocca of Beatrix Children’s Hospital in Groningen, studied 75 heavy children who had been randomly assigned to get either usual care or an intensive weight-loss program. The program lasted four months and involved 25 sessions with dietary advice, exercise and, for the parents only, behavioral counseling.

A year after the study began, kids in the intervention group had gained 4.2 pounds on average, and those who got usual care had added another 6.8 pounds.

While that difference could have been due to chance, there was a statistically reliable difference in body mass index, or BMI, a measure of height in relation to weight.

Children in the intervention group went one unit down in BMI, while the others saw no change. In adults, a healthy BMI is between 18.5 and 25.

“The magnitude of the effect, especially initially after the intervention, wasn’t very large, but what needs to be taken into account was that these children were growing,” Taveras told Reuters Health.

“What these interventions are showing is that you can have an effect, and hopefully these interventions are changing the trajectory the children were headed towards.”

PARTICULARLY TOUGH CASES?

She also cautioned that the Swedish findings, led by Pernilla Danielsson of Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, were based on observations instead of an experiment.

That means it’s possible that the youngsters between 14 and 16, who saw no or little effect of the behavioral treatment, could have been particularly tough cases.

Still, Taveras said, there is good evidence that heavy kids who start weight-loss programs early have an easier time slimming down.

Weight-loss programs for kids are available from healthcare providers across the country and are often covered by insurance, she said, adding that interested families could ask their pediatrician or check with local public health departments.

The government is also funding research that takes a more comprehensive approach to keeping children’s weight healthy. The Childhood Obesity Research Demonstration, for example, includes sites in three states and attacks the problem at various levels. At the Massachusetts site, Taveras said primary care doctors, child care centers and schools are all involved in the efforts.

“I hope that in a few years there will be more examples of programs that aren’t just clinical that we can send families to,” she said.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/PogxGc Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, online October 29, 2012.

Parenting/Kids News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Ukraine’s opposition doing well in election

KIEV, Ukraine (AP) —

Ukraine’s opposition parties performed strongly in Sunday’s parliamentary vote, according to an exit poll, but President Viktor Yanukovych‘s party could still retain control of the legislature as its members are likely to sweep individual races across the country.

The West is paying close attention to the conduct of the vote in the strategic ex-Soviet state, which lies between Russia and the European Union, and serves as a key conduit for transit of Russian energy supplies to many EU countries. An election deemed unfair would likely turn Ukraine further away from the West and toward Moscow.

Opposition parties alleged widespread violations on election day, such as vote-buying and a suspiciously high amount of home voting, but a local election monitor said those violations were isolated. Authorities insisted the election was honest and democratic.

The Fatherland party, led by the jailed charismatic former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, the Udar (Punch) of world boxing champion Vitali Klitschko and a nationalist party together received more than 50 percent of the vote on party lists, outnumbering Yanukovych’s Party of Regions and its traditional ally, the Communist Party.

Both Yanukovych’s and Tymoshenko’s parties claimed victory, saying the election showed the voters trust them to lead the country.

However, only half of the parliament’s 450 seats are split proportionately between the winning parties. The other half is filled by the winners of single-mandate races, where Yanukovych loyalists are expected to make a strong showing. In the election, each voter had two ballots, one with party names and one with the name of candidates in specific constituencies. No exit poll numbers were available for the individual races.

With Yanukovych under fire over the jailing of his top rival, Tymoshenko; rampant corruption and slow reforms, the opposition made a strong showing.

Tymoshenko’s Fatherland party is poised to get about 25 percent of the proportional vote, the Udar (Punch) led by world boxing champion Vitali Klitschko is set to get around 15 percent and the nationalist Svoboda (Freedom) party receives some 12 percent. The Party of Regions polled 28 percent and the Communists nearly 12 percent.

If the three opposition groups unite, they could get 127 parliament seats versus 98 seats gained by the Regions and Communists. The distribution of the remaining 225 seats is expected to be clear Monday.

Opposition forces hope to garner enough parliament seats to weaken Yanukovych’s power and undo the damage they say he has done: the jailing of Tymoshenko and her top allies, the concentration of power in the hands of the president, the snubbing of the Ukrainian language in favor of Russian, waning media freedoms, a deteriorating business climate and growing corruption.

The strong showing by the far-right Svoboda (Freedom) party which campaigns for the defense of the Ukrainian language and culture but is also infamous for xenophobic and anti-Semitic rhetoric emerged as a surprise and showed the widespread disappointment and anger with the ruling party.

It remains to be seen whether Tymoshenko’s group, Klitschko’s party and Svoboda can forge a strong alliance and challenge Yanukovych.

The election tainted by Tymoshenko’s jailing on charges of abuse of office has also been compromised by the creation of fake opposition parties, campaigns by politically unskilled celebrities, and the use of state resources and greater access to television by Yanukovych’s party.

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Yuras Karmanau in Kiev contributed to this report.

Europe News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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