Anmer Hall, on the Sandringham estate
REX USA
That's the speculation in Britain, where the magnificent Anmer Hall on the Sandringham estate, Queen Elizabeth's retreat in Norfolk, has been mentioned as a possible family home for William and Kate when they leave Wales.
A report in the Sunday Telegraph suggested the house, in the tiny village of Anmer, 120 miles north of London, is being earmarked for the couple. But it is believed the current tenants may stay for a few more years.
Still, royal preparations could already be in the works. The estate reportedly applied in December for a series of planning measures for the home. Details are not being made public, for security reasons, but PEOPLE has confirmed they include rerouting the driveway into the property, extending a garage block and converting woods stores for accommodation.
Building a new "garden room" is also in the plans.
William knows the house well, as his close friends the van Cutsem family rented it for many years. Emilie van Cutsem, the mother of four sons who are close to Princes William and Harry, was seen by some as a surrogate mother to the princes in their teen years, after they lost their mother Diana, Princess of Wales.
Buckingham Palace had no comment, saying the house is a private home on a private estate.
NEW YORK (AP) — From the Rocky Mountains to New England, hospitals are swamped with people with flu symptoms. Some medical centers have limited visitors, and one Pennsylvania hospital set up a tent outside its ER to handle the feverish patients.
Flu season in the U.S. has hit early and, in some places, hard. But whether this will be considered a bad season by the time it has run its course in the spring remains to be seen.
"Those of us with gray hair have seen worse," said Dr. William Schaffner, a flu expert at Vanderbilt University in Nashville.
The evidence so far is pointing to a moderate season, Schaffner and others believe. It just looks bad compared with last year — an unusually mild one.
Flu usually doesn't blanket the country until late January or February, but it is already widespread in more than 40 states.
What's probably complicating the situation: The main influenza virus this year tends to make people sicker. And there are other bugs out there causing flu-like illnesses. So what people are calling the flu may, in fact, be something else.
"There may be more of an overlap than we normally see," said Dr. Joseph Bresee, who tracks the flu for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The flu's early arrival in the U.S. coincided with spikes in a variety of other viruses, including a childhood malady that mimics flu and a new norovirus that causes what some people call "stomach flu."
Most people don't undergo lab tests to confirm flu, and the symptoms are so similar that it's sometimes hard to distinguish flu from other viruses, or even a cold. Over the holidays, 250 people were sickened at a Mormon missionary training center in Utah, but the culprit turned out to be a norovirus, not the flu.
Flu is a major contributor, though, to what's going on.
"I'd say 75 percent," said Dr. Dan Surdam, head of the emergency department at Cheyenne Regional Medical Center, Wyoming's largest hospital. The 17-bed ER saw its busiest day ever last week, with 166 visitors.
The early onslaught has resulted in a spike in hospitalizations, prompting hospitals to take steps to deal with the influx and protect other patients from getting sick, including restricting visits from children, requiring family members to wear masks, and banning anyone with flu symptoms from maternity wards.
One hospital in Allentown, Pa., this week set up a tent for a steady stream of patients with flu symptoms.
But so far, "what we're seeing is a typical flu season," said Terry Burger, director of infection control and prevention for the hospital, Lehigh Valley Hospital-Cedar Crest.
On Wednesday, Boston declared a public health emergency, and all the flu activity has caused some to question whether this year's flu shot is working.
There's a new flu vaccine each year, based on the best guess of what flu viruses will be strongest that year. This year's vaccine is well-matched to what's going around. The government estimates that between a third and a half of Americans have gotten the vaccine.
But the vaccine isn't foolproof, and even those who were vaccinated can still get sick. At best, the vaccine may be only 75 percent effective in younger people and even less so in the elderly and people with weak immune systems.
Health officials are analyzing the vaccine's effectiveness, but early indications are that about 60 percent of all vaccinated people have been protected from the flu. That's in line with how effective flu vaccines have been in other years.
In New York City, 57-year-old Judith Quinones suffered her worst case of flu-like illness in years, laid up for nearly a month with fever and body aches. "I just couldn't function," she said.
She decided to skip getting a flu shot last fall. But her daughter got the shot. "And she got sick twice," Quinones said.
On average, about 24,000 Americans die each flu season, according to the CDC.
Flu usually peaks in midwinter. Symptoms can include fever, cough, runny nose, head and body aches and fatigue. Some people also suffer vomiting and diarrhea, and some develop pneumonia or other severe complications.
Most people with flu have a mild illness and can help themselves and protect others by staying home and resting. But people with severe symptoms should see a doctor. They may be given antiviral drugs or other medications to ease symptoms.
The last bad flu season involved a swine flu that hit in two waves in the spring and fall of 2009. But that was considered a unique strain, different from the regular winter flu.
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Online:
CDC flu: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/index.htm
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks climbed on Thursday on optimism about global growth spurred by stronger-than-expected exports in China, the world's second-biggest economy, and the S&P 500 hovered around a five-year high.
Financial and energy stocks were the day's top gainers in afternoon trading. The financial sector index <.gspf> rose 1 percent and the energy sector <.gspe> was up 0.7 percent.
Financials benefited from events this week that added clarity to mortgage rules and banks' potential exposure to the housing market.
The government's consumer finance watchdog announced mortgage rules on Thursday that will force banks to use new criteria to determine whether a borrower can repay a home loan.
Earlier this week, several big mortgage lenders reached a deal with regulators to end a review of foreclosures mandated by the government.
Bank of America
"It's a resolution. It's not hanging over their heads," said Kurt Brunner, portfolio manager at Swarthmore Group in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Data showed China's export growth rebounded sharply to a seven-month high in December, a strong finish to the year after seven straight quarters of slowdown.
"In and of itself it is being interpreted positively that they've stopped the downturn (in growth)," said Brunner. "If they continue to produce good growth, that's going to be supportive of our global manufacturers."
The benchmark Standard & Poor's 500 index hovered near a five-year closing peak of 1,466.47. On Friday, the index had closed at its highest since December 2007.
"The market is technically right at the level of resistance, near 1,465-1,467," said Randy Frederick, managing director of active trading and derivatives at Charles Schwab.
"A solid breakthrough above the level would be the start of a next leg higher, but it looks like it is going to be difficult to break above that level for now," Frederick said, citing concerns about the corporate earnings season and impending negotiations over the U.S. debt ceiling.
The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> gained 40.53 points, or 0.30 percent, to 13,431.04. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> rose 5.41 points, or 0.37 percent, to 1,466.43. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> edged up 0.42 points, or 0.01 percent, at 3,106.23.
Thursday's session had earlier included a dip that traders said was triggered by a trade in the options market that prompted a large amount of S&P futures to hit the market at the same time. That sent the S&P 500 index down rapidly but those losses were recouped by late afternoon.
Shares of upscale jeweler Tiffany
Herbalife Ltd
(Editing by Nick Zieminski)
QUETTA, Pakistan (Reuters) - At least 101 people were killed in bombings in two Pakistani cities on Thursday in one of the country's bloodiest days in recent years, officials said, with most casualties caused by sectarian attacks in Quetta.
The bombings underscored the myriad threats Pakistani security forces face from homegrown Sunni extremist groups, the Taliban insurgency in the northwest and the less well-known Baloch insurgency in the southwest.
On Thursday evening, two coordinated explosions killed at least 69 people and injured more than 100 in Quetta, the provincial capital of Balochistan, said Deputy Inspector of Police Hamid Shakil.
The first attack, in a crowded snooker hall, was a suicide bombing, local residents said. About ten minutes later, a car bomb exploded, they said. Five policemen and a cameraman were among the dead from that blast.
The attacks happened in a predominately Shia neighborhood and banned sectarian group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi claimed responsibility. The extremist Sunni group targets Shias, who make up about 20 percent of Pakistani's population.
Targeted killings and bombings of Shia communities are common in Pakistan, and rights groups say hundreds of Shia were killed last year. Militant groups in Balochistan frequently bomb or shoot Shia passengers on buses travelling to neighboring Iran.
The killers are rarely caught and some Shia activists say militants work alongside elements of Pakistan's security forces, who see them as a potential bulwark against neighboring India.
Many Pakistanis fear their nation could become the site of a regional power struggle between Saudi Arabia, source of funding for Sunni extremist groups, and Iran, which is largely Shia.
But sectarian tensions are not the only source of violence.
The United Baloch Army claimed responsibility for a blast in Quetta's market earlier in the day. It killed 11 people and injured more than 40, mostly vegetable sellers and secondhand clothes dealers, police officer Zubair Mehmood said. A child was also killed.
The group is one of several fighting for independence for Balochistan, an arid, impoverished region with substantial gas, copper and gold reserves, which constitutes just under half of Pakistan's territory and is home to about 8 million of the country's population of 180 million.
SWAT BOMBING
In another incident Thursday, 21 were killed and more than 60 injured in a bombing when people gathered to hear a religious leader speak in Mingora, the largest city in the northwestern province of Swat, police and officials at the Saidu Sharif hospital said.
"The death toll may rise as some of the injured are in critical condition and we are receiving more and more injured people," said Dr. Niaz Mohammad.
It has been more than two years since a militant attack has claimed that many lives in Swat.
The mountainous region, formerly a tourist destination, has been administered by the Pakistani army since their 2009 offensive drove out Taliban militants who had taken control.
But Talibans retain the ability to attack in Swat and shot schoolgirl campaigner Malala Yousufzai in Mingora last October.
A Taliban spokesman said they were not responsible for Thursday's bombing.
(Additional reporting by Jibran Ahmad in Peshawar, Pakistan; Writing by Katharine Houreld; Editing by Mark Heinrich and Jason Webb)
At the start of the New Year, when weight loss is often a priority, building a support team to help keep us on track can be extremely helpful. This might typically consist of family members, friends, co-workers, or perhaps even a nutritionist or registered dietitian. But today, support can also be found online. Plenty of Web sites focus on losing weight, and include communities that provide support and encouragement. Since many of us spend a lot of time on social media sites–maybe too much if you ask my husband!–why not use these platforms as another tool for support? In fact, one study suggests employees participating in a workplace wellness program who also joined the company’s Facebook page, run by a registered dietitian, stayed with the program longer than those who didn’t.
[See Already Struggling With Your New Year's Resolution?]
Could it actually make sense that gluing ourselves to our mobile device or computer could help us shed pounds? It sounds like quite the oxymoron, since increased screen time doesn’t usually equate to weight loss. But here’s how to make social media sites work for you:
Facebook is a place where you can share what’s going on in your life with friends, but you may not feel comfortable announcing what you weigh or that you’re trying to lose weight. On the other hand, you may enjoy posting fitness milestones, such as training for and completing your first marathon, or a bike ride for your favorite charity. Sharing your fitness goals with the Facebook universe may be helpful, because the more people who know about it, the more likely you are to stay committed.
[See Small Steps, Big Change: How to Lose 50 Pounds Without Really Trying]
Rather than simply connecting with friends on the site, you can also connect with health and fitness professionals, such as registered dietitians, or pages for diet books, like mine, The Small Change Diet. You can also “like” the pages of health and fitness magazines and your favorite brands. The folks who run these pages may post articles that provide you with helpful weight-loss tips, and many organize regular Facebook chats, allowing you to ask an expert your questions. The more that healthy information is “in your face,” the more likely you are to stick to it.
Most importantly, you may discover a weight-loss community on Facebook, where like-minded individuals share their weight losses (or gains) and offer support. Daily accountability could be just what you need, and knowing others are rooting for you can make a world of difference. If you can’t find a Facebook community you like, start your own.
So many of my patients don’t have Twitter accounts, because they think they have nothing clever or witty to say. My advice to them is always the same: You don’t have to “say” anything; you can just follow, at least at the beginning. Registered dietitians (I’m @kerigans) have great tips and, if they’re like me, are more than happy to answer questions via Twitter. I’ve had followers tweet a picture of their dinner and ask what my dietitian colleagues and I thought of it–priceless information for free.
[See Best Plant-Based Diets]
Just as you do on Facebook, follow fitness professionals, health magazines, and other sources that provide weight-loss motivation. Once you feel comfortable, you may decide to join in the conversation, since that’s what social media is all about. Perfect example of how it can benefit you: One morning, I tweeted that I felt more like staying in my pajamas than going to yoga. Some of my followers chimed in that they were feeling the same way, BUT stressed that we should all still exercise. And so we all did. And trust me, none of us regretted going–rather, we were thankful for each other.
[See Are Mobile Health Apps Helpful?]
Seek out people on Twitter and Facebook who you find inspirational, and hopefully a little of what they do will rub off on you. Since nothing is etched in stone, you can unfollow, unlike, or unfriend them if they aren’t helping you. And please keep in mind that while social media can be another tool in your pursuit of weight loss, it’s not the end all. Healthy eating, fitness, and plenty of sleep actually need to happen away from a screen.
Hungry for more? Write to [email protected] with your questions, concerns, and feedback
Keri Gans, MS, RD, CDN, is a registered dietitian, media personality, spokesperson, and author of The Small Change Diet. Gans’s expert nutrition advice has been featured in Glamour, Fitness, Health, Self and Shape, and on national television and radio, including The Dr. Oz Show, Good Morning America, ABC News, Primetime, and Sirius/XM Dr. Radio.
Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News
01/09/2013 at 03:30 PM ET
It’s baby number five for Rosie O’Donnell!
The comedian and wife Michelle Rounds welcomed daughter Dakota through adoption on Saturday, Jan. 5, her rep confirms to PEOPLE. Weighing in at 5 lbs., 5 oz., “moms and baby are healthy and happy.”
O’Donnell, 50, Tweeted the happy news Wednesday.
“We [are] thrilled to announce the arrival of [our] daughter Dakota – #withloveandthanks – AMEN,” she writes, sharing a snapshot of herself cuddling with Rounds and their new baby.
O’Donnell is already mom to children Vivienne, 10, Blake, 13, Chelsea, 15, and Parker, 17, with her ex, Kelli Carpenter.
After suffering a heart attack and dealing with Rounds’ desmoid tumors diagnosis last year, O’Donnell tells PEOPLE, “I will gladly stay home. I want to try to work hard at getting myself healthy, on Mich and I getting started and maybe finding a baby.”
Courtesy Rosie O’Donnell
– Sarah Michaud with reporting by Liz McNeil
WASHINGTON (AP) — For years, doctors have lamented that there's no Pap test for deadly ovarian cancer. Wednesday, scientists reported a tantalizing hint that one day, there might be.
Researchers are trying to retool the Pap, a test for cervical cancer that millions of women get, so that it could spot early signs of other gynecologic cancers, too.
How? It turns out that cells can flake off of tumors in the ovaries or the lining of the uterus, and float down to rest in the cervix, where Pap tests are performed. These cells are too rare to recognize under the microscope. But researchers from Johns Hopkins University used some sophisticated DNA testing on the Pap samples to uncover the evidence — gene mutations that show cancer is present.
In a pilot study, they analyzed Pap smears from 46 women who already were diagnosed with either ovarian or endometrial cancer. The new technique found all the endometrial cancers and 41 percent of the ovarian tumors, the team reported Wednesday in the journal Science Translational Medicine.
This is very early-stage research, and women shouldn't expect any change in their routine Paps. It will take years of additional testing to prove if the so-called PapGene technique really could work as a screening tool, used to spot cancer in women who thought they were healthy.
"Now the hard work begins," said Hopkins oncologist Dr. Luis Diaz, whose team is collecting hundreds of additional Pap samples for more study and is exploring ways to enhance the detection of ovarian cancer.
But if it ultimately pans out, "the neat part about this is, the patient won't feel anything different," and the Pap wouldn't be performed differently, Diaz added. The extra work would come in a lab.
The gene-based technique marks a new approach toward cancer screening, and specialists are watching closely.
"This is very encouraging, and it shows great potential," said American Cancer Society genetics expert Michael Melner.
"We are a long way from being able to see any impact on our patients," cautioned Dr. Shannon Westin of the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. She reviewed the research in an accompanying editorial, and said the ovarian cancer detection would need improvement if the test is to work.
But she noted that ovarian cancer has poor survival rates because it's rarely caught early. "If this screening test could identify ovarian cancer at an early stage, there would be a profound impact on patient outcomes and mortality," Westin said.
More than 22,000 U.S. women are diagnosed with ovarian cancer each year, and more than 15,000 die. Symptoms such as pain and bloating seldom are obvious until the cancer is more advanced, and numerous attempts at screening tests have failed.
Endometrial cancer affects about 47,000 women a year, and kills about 8,000. There is no screening test for it either, but most women are diagnosed early because of postmenopausal bleeding.
The Hopkins research piggybacks on one of the most successful cancer screening tools, the Pap, and a newer technology used along with it. With a standard Pap, a little brush scrapes off cells from the cervix, which are stored in a vial to examine for signs of cervical cancer. Today, many women's Paps undergo an additional DNA-based test to see if they harbor the HPV virus, which can spur cervical cancer.
So the Hopkins team, funded largely by cancer advocacy groups, decided to look for DNA evidence of other gynecologic tumors. It developed a method to rapidly screen the Pap samples for those mutations using standard genetics equipment that Diaz said wouldn't add much to the cost of a Pap-plus-HPV test. He said the technique could detect both early-stage and more advanced tumors. Importantly, tests of Paps from 14 healthy women turned up no false alarms.
The endometrial cancers may have been easier to find because cells from those tumors don't have as far to travel as ovarian cancer cells, Diaz said. Researchers will study whether inserting the Pap brush deeper, testing during different times of the menstrual cycle, or other factors might improve detection of ovarian cancer.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks rose on Wednesday as Alcoa's better-than-expected revenue and a positive outlook boosted investor confidence ahead of an earnings season expected to show lackluster results.
The session's rise was the first of the week after the market retreated from the S&P 500's highest point in five years, hit last Friday. Worries about a weak earnings season kept the markets down earlier in the week.
Shares of Alcoa Inc were trading flat after early gains, following the company's earnings release after the bell on Tuesday. The largest U.S. aluminum producer said it expects global demand for aluminum to grow in 2013.
Traders have been cautious as the current quarter was shaping up like the previous one, with companies lowering expectations in recent weeks, said James Dailey, portfolio manager of TEAM Asset Strategy Fund in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
"So the big question and focus is on revenue, and Alcoa had better-than-expected revenue," which calmed the market a little, Dailey said.
Overall, corporate profits were expected to beat the previous quarter's meager 0.1 percent rise. Both earnings and revenues in the fourth quarter were expected to grow by 1.9 percent, according to Thomson Reuters data.
The lowered expectations also leave room for companies to surprise investors even if their results are not particularly strong, analysts said.
The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> gained 59.47 points, or 0.45 percent, at 13,388.32. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> rose 3.86 points, or 0.26 percent, at 1,461.01. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was up 14.93 points, or 0.48 percent, at 3,106.74.
Clearwire Corp
Herbalife Ltd
Facebook Inc
Apollo Group Inc slid after heavier losses early on, a day after it reported lower student sign-ups for the third straight quarter and cut its operating profit outlook for 2013. Apollo's shares were last off 6.6 percent at $19.55.
(Reporting by Gabriel Debenedetti; additional reporting by Angela Moon; Editing by Nick Zieminski)
CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuela's top court endorsed the postponement of Hugo Chavez's inauguration this week and ruled on Wednesday that the cancer-stricken president and his deputy would continue in their roles, despite a cacophony of opposition complaints.
Critics had argued the 58-year-old's absence from his own swearing-in ceremony on January 10 meant a caretaker president must be appointed. Chavez has not been seen in public nor heard from in almost a month following surgery in Cuba.
"Right now we cannot say when, how or where the president will be sworn in," Supreme Court Chief Judge Luisa Morales told a news conference.
"As president re-elect there is no interruption of performance of duties ... The inauguration can be carried out at a later date before the Supreme Court."
The decision opens the door in theory for Chavez to remain in office for weeks or months more from a Cuban hospital bed - though there is no evidence he is even conscious.
It leaves the South American country in the hands of Vice President Nicolas Maduro, as de facto leader of the government.
The opposition say that is a brazen violation of the constitution, and that Maduro should leave office on Thursday when the current presidential term had been due to expire.
They say National Assembly boss Diosdado Cabello, another powerful Chavez ally, should take over the running of the country while new elections would be organized within 30 days.
Maduro would be the ruling Socialist Party's candidate.
Government leaders insist Chavez, 58, is fulfilling his duties as head of state, even though official medical bulletins say he suffered complications after the surgery, including a severe lung infection, and has had trouble breathing.
His resignation or death would transform politics in the OPEC nation, where he is revered by poor supporters thankful for his social largesse, but denounced by opponents as a dictator.
RALLY PLANNED FOR THURSDAY
Moody's Investors Service warned on Wednesday that Venezuela's sovereign credit rating, already at junk status, faces short-term risks over any political transition.
Prices of Venezuela's widely traded bonds have soared lately on Chavez's health woes, but dipped this week as investors' expectations of a quick government change apparently dimmed.
The president has undergone four operations, as well as weeks of chemotherapy and radiation treatment, since being diagnosed with an undisclosed type of cancer in his pelvic area in June 2011.
He looked to have staged a remarkable recovery from the illness last year, winning a new six-year term at a hard-fought election in October. But within weeks of his victory he had to return to Havana for more treatment.
The government has called for a huge rally outside the Miraflores presidential palace in Caracas on Thursday, and allied leaders including Uruguay's Jose Mujica and Bolivia's Evo Morales have said they will visit - despite Chavez's absence.
Argentine President Cristina Fernandez, a close friend, has announced plans to visit Chavez in Cuba on Friday.
The unprecedented silence by Chavez, who is well known for his hours-long rambling speeches, has convinced many Venezuelans that his 14 years in power may be coming to an end.
Unlike after his previous operations in Cuba, no photographs have been published of him recuperating, and social media in Venezuela is buzzing with rumors he is on life support.
Cabello, the pugnacious head of the National Assembly, has repeatedly ruled out taking over as caretaker president to order a new presidential election, saying Chavez remains in charge.
"Tomorrow we will all go to the Miraflores palace," he told a televised Socialist Party meeting on Wednesday. "The people will be invested as president. We are all Chavez!"
(Additional reporting by Marianna Parraga and Diego Ore; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne)
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