The number of swine flu cases has doubled in a week to 100,000 – leaving England in the grip of an epidemic. It came as officials warned that a third of those who have died so far had no serious underlying health problems. Such is the level of concern that the new National Flu Pandemic Service website crashed within minutes of going live after receiving 2,600 hits a second, or 9.3million an hour. Prepared: Masked Italian students arrive at Stansted as news breaks that swine flu cases in England doubles in a week to 100,000 The Health Protection Agency yesterday said for the first time that the disease was probably at epidemic levels – or one in 500 people reporting flu-like illness. It makes it the most virulent flu outbreak since the winter of 1999/2000, when 21,000 lost their lives. The NHS is planning for up to 65,000 deaths from swine flu, with 30 per cent of the population – and 50 per cent of children – catching the infection. Most of the new cases were children aged under 14 – dubbed ‘super spreaders’ of the virus by the chief medical […]
The following is adapted from $20 Per Gallon: How the Inevitable Rise in the Price of Gasoline Will Change Our Lives for the Better by Christopher Steiner, Grand Central Publishing (2009). The world’s airline executives stare at the very real possibility of disaster every day. If they don’t outwardly acknowledge that they’re living on leased time, they think it. They think it every hour of every day that they show up for work. Everything that airlines have done in the last five years–paring their workforces; charging for checked baggage; stripping away in-flight meals; raising mileage requirements for reward flights; asking $4 for a tiny package of Oreos; and generally thinking up fees for anything they can–has been done to offset the concrete baluster of fuel prices steadily dragging them toward extinction. There has been no industry in the history of the world that has defied the simple laws of economics as long as the airline business. How do the major traditional carriers of the United States–United, American, US Airways, Delta, Northwest and Continental–survive year after year? American stock market investors have a strange affinity for airlines. The airline model, which, even in the best of times, has small […]
WASHINGTON — A new global poll has found a vast improvement in views of the U.S. since the election of President Barack Obama. But the poll, taken by the Pew Global Attitudes Project, also found broad opposition to one of Obama’s key policies – sending more troops to Afghanistan – and a less favorable view of the U.S. among Israelis compared with previous surveys. In 21 of the 24 countries surveyed, an average of 71 percent of respondents had at least some confidence in the U.S. president’s handling of world affairs, the Pew report found. In 2008, when President George W. Bush was in the White House, the figure in those same countries was only 17 percent. ‘The image of the United States has improved markedly in most parts of the world, reflecting global confidence in Barack Obama,’ the center said in its annual Global Attitudes Report. Several specific administration policies drew near-universal acclaim, including Obama’s pledge to close the detention facility for terrorism suspects at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and the U.S. timeline for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq. Sending more troops to Afghanistan was the only policy tested that was opposed by majorities in […]
SEOUL, South Korea - Hyundai Motor Co. outshined its global rivals by reporting a record quarterly profit on Thursday, as a weak won helped overseas sales and government incentives boosted domestic demand for cars. Net income for the April-June quarter soared 48 percent to 811.9 billion won, or $650 million, South Korea’s largest car maker said in a statement. The figure compared with 546.9 billion won in net profit a year earlier and a 225 billion won profit in the first quarter of this year. Sales rose to 8.08 trillion won from 6.03 trillion won in the first quarter but fell from 9.11 trillion won a year before. Like its competitors, Hyundai has been hit by falling demand amid the global economic downturn. But it has worked aggressively to expand its market share amid the chaos, seizing on its improving global brand image, a growing appetite for smaller cars and the benefits of a weak South Korean currency, which makes Korean cars cheaper abroad. The won’s value in the second quarter was down 20.8 percent against the U.S. dollar from a year earlier. Hyundai’s overseas affiliates, especially those in China and India, contributed to the […]
The poor economy is taking a toll even on the dead, with an increasing number of bodies in Los Angeles County going unclaimed by families who cannot afford to bury or cremate their loved ones. At the county coroner’s office — which handles homicides and other suspicious deaths — 36% more cremations were done at taxpayers’ expense in the last fiscal year over the previous year, from 525 to 712. The county morgue, which is responsible for the indigent and others who go unclaimed, saw a 25% increase in cremations in the first half of this year over the same period a year ago, rising to 680 from 545. The demands on the county crematorium have been so high that earlier this year, officials there stopped accepting bodies from the coroner. The coroner’s office since has contracted with two private crematories for $135,000 to handle the overflow. ‘It’s a pretty dramatic increase,’ said Lt. David Smith, a coroner’s investigator. ‘The families just tell us flat-out they don’t have the money to do a funeral.’ FOR THE RECORD: An article in Tuesday’s Section A about the increasing number of unclaimed bodies in Los Angeles County, as more […]
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
