35 US hospitals ready to treat Ebola patients

Atlanta :  US health authorities have announced that the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention have designated a total of 35 hospitals to be ready to treat Ebola patients.

The CDC worked together with state health authorities to determine which hospitals could be designated "Ebola treatment centres".

"As long as Ebola is spreading in West Africa, we must prepare for the possibility of additional cases in the United States," said CDC Director Tom Frieden in a written statement Tuesday after the announcement of the move.

The medical centres in question have the trained personal and resources to provide the "full treatment" required by Ebola patients, while at the same time minimising the risk of infecting healthcare workers.

"We are implementing and constantly strengthening multiple levels of protection, including increasing the number of hospitals that have the training and capabilities to manage the complex care of an Ebola patient," Frieden added.

"These hospitals have worked hard to rigorously assess their capabilities and train their staff," he said.

The 35 hospitals that have been outfitted to treat Ebola patients will complement the three specialised medical centres in the US that already treat patients with highly contagious diseases, including Emory University Hospital, the Nebraska Medical Centre and the National Institutes of Health, where all the Ebola patients on US territory have been treated so far.

The network of hospitals, which are in areas near the five main cities that serve as entry points for passengers coming from the part of Africa most seriously affected by the disease, will also obtain crucial information about the active observation programme currently under way to monitor such travelers.

According to US health authorities, more than 80 percent of the passengers coming from the region affected by the virus live less than 200 miles from one of the Ebola treatment centres.

Sun-like stars not all that dusty

Washington : Sun-like stars are not all that dusty, reveals a new study, adding that less dust means better odds of snapping clear pictures of the stars' planets in the future.

“Dust is a double-edged sword when it comes to imaging distant planets. The presence of dust is a signpost for planets but too much dust can block our view,” said Bertrand Mennesson from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California.

These results come from surveying nearly 50 stars from 2008 to 2011 using the Keck Interferometer, a former NASA key science project that combined the power of the twin WM Keck Observatory telescopes atop Mauna Kea in Hawaii.

In the latest study, mature, Sun-like stars were analysed with high precision to search for warm, room-temperature dust in their habitable zones.

The other stars in the study were already known to have significant amounts of distant, cold dust orbiting them.

Many of such stars were found to also have the room-temperature dust.

This is the first time a direct link between the cold and warm dust has been established.

“In other words, if a star is observed to have a cold belt of dust, astronomers now can make an educated guess that its warm habitable zone is also riddled with dust, making it a poor target for imaging exo-Earths,” Mennesson said.

The next challenge is to image smaller planets in the “habitable” zone around stars where possible life-bearing “exo-Earths” - Earth-like planets outside the solar system - could reside.

The paper appeared in the Astrophysical Journal.

Venezuelan fined $89,000 for joke about bomb on plane

Miami :  A Miami judge has fined a Venezuelan traveler $89,000 for joking last October that he was carrying explosives in his luggage, for which the authorities declared a security alert at two terminals at the city's international airport, a court announced.

Most of the money that Manuel Alberto Alvarado, 60, must pay will serve to defray the cost of flight delays caused to five airlines at the Miami International Airport (MIA), channel NBC 6 said Tuesday.

Alvarado, a surgeon by profession who remains free in the US on $50,000 bail, at first faced criminal charges for saying he was carrying a bomb in his luggage and then saying it was only a wisecrack.

But in the end, the District Attorney's Office decided not to file formal charges for the false bomb scare against Alvarado, who apologised in writing for what he did.

"I'm ashamed and I'm sorry for the stupidity of what I said. I am very sorry," the Venezuelan doctor said.

Prosecutors said it was no joke to frighten passengers, cause flight delays and shut down two of the airport's terminals for three hours because of a fake bomb scare.

After the supposed threat, agents launched a search operation but found no explosives.

Alvarado's attorney Brian Bieber at first denied that his client said he had explosives in his luggage Wednesday, minutes before boarding a plane, and said it was all a "misunderstanding".

However, Bieber later said that "he is extremely remorseful".

"He had no intent to place anyone in fear. He made what turned out to be the worst mistake of his life," Bieber said.

Alvarado, who has no criminal record, was boarding an Avianca airliner at MIA for a flight to Colombia.

Warm Wednesday in Delhi

New Delhi : It was a pleasant Wednesday morning here. The Met Office has forecast the day will be warm.

The minimum temperature was recorded four notches above the season's average at 14 degrees Celsius, while the maximum temperature is expected to reach up to 29 degrees Celsius.

The humidity at 8.30 a.m. was 67 percent.

Tuesday was warm with the maximum temperature settling three degrees above the season's average at 28 degrees Celsius, while the minimum was recorded five notches above the season's average at 13.8 degrees Celsius.

India-US partnership poised for the next level: India envoy nominee

Washington : Richard Rahul Verma, the first Indian-American to be nominated as the US Ambassador to India, believes there is renewed enthusiasm on both sides to take a reenergized India-US partnership to the next level.

"There is no question that this is a defining and exciting time in the US-India relationship," he told the Senate Foreign Relations committee Tuesday at his confirmation hearing.

Verma, 45, a former key aide to then secretary of state Hillary Clinton, noted that President Barack Obama "will make a historic visit to India in January, becoming the first US head of state to attend India's Republic Day and the only sitting US president to visit India twice."

"His trip will build on Prime Minister Modi's highly successful visit to the United States this past September," he said.

"There's little doubt the relationship has been reenergized, with renewed enthusiasm to take our partnership to the next level," said Verma , who was named as the US envoy to India just ahead of Modi's visit.

If, as widely expected, Verma is confirmed by the full Senate, two Indian-Americans will be dealing with matters relating to India in both Washington and New Delhi. Nisha Desai Biswal, hailing from Prime Minister Narendra Modi's home state of Gujarat, became the first Indian American to head State Department's South Asia bureau last November.

Recalling his past association with the panel, Verma said "If confirmed, I am committed to partnering with you again in shaping our relationship to India - a country so important that President Obama called it the defining relationship for the United States in the 21st Century."

"The US and India share a wide-range of critical national interests," he said. "Our partnership is deep, it touches nearly every endeavor of human pursuit, and it has produced important gains for each of our countries."

"Across Asia, US and Indian interests are converging. India has been called the lynchpin of our Asia rebalance," Verma said.

"With India's Look East, and now Act East policies, our two countries can play a critically important role together in bolstering peace and security and promoting a rules-based, liberal, democratic order in the

Indo-Pacific region," he said

"The ripple effects of our partnership need not be limited to Asia," Verma said.

He cited Modi as noting, "the true power and potential in this relationship is that when the oldest and largest democracies come together, the world will benefit."

Verma acknowledged that India and US "will have our differences from time to time - close friends often do - but when we do have differences, it is imperative that we maintain a healthy dialogue."

Expressing deep appreciation of all those who have worked so hard on cultivating this relationship over many decades," he also acknowledged the contribution of immigrants from the Indian subcontinent.

They "took a chance like my parents, who worked hard, who continue to pursue their dreams, and along the way have helped ensure India and the United States become the closest of friends and partners," Verma said vowing to "strive to live up to the high standards they have set."

The New Delhi post has been vacant since the previous ambassador Nancy Powell quit in May after India-US ties hit a low after a major diplomatic spat over the December arrest and strip search of Indian diplomat Devyani Khobragade in New York.

Kathleen Stephens, a career foreign service official has served as chargé d'affaires in New Delhi since July.

Journalist Allwyn Fernandes is dead

Mumbai : Media personality Allwyn Fernandes, a former chief reporter of The Times Of India in Mumbai, is dead, a family member said here Wednesday.

Fernandes, 66, had been ailing with cancer for some time, but his condition sharply deteriorated in the past couple of months. He died late Tuesday.

He is survived by his wife Enid, son Rohan and daughter Rohini.

The funeral mass will be held at the Vincent Palloti Church followed by the funeral at the St. John The Evangelist cemetery in Marol from 3 p.m. onwards Wednesday, Rohan said.

Educated at the Fatima High School in Mumbai, Fernandes graduated from St. Xaviers College and later did his advanced journalism course from International Institute for Journalism, Berlin.

He started his career as a teacher, but joined The Times of India in Mumbai in 1969 and later became its chief reporter, known for his series of investigative articles and news features on various topics, especially the railways.

After 25 years with the newspaper, he sought voluntary retirement and became a communications professional with Edelman India, besides imparting training in communications skills, crisis management and writing, including a biography of the late M.R. Pai.

Three children dead in China accident

Beijing : Three children died in China after their school bus collided head on with a truck, authorities said Wednesday.

An initial investigation said the bus was a legitimately-licensed school bus with a school in Shandong Province's Kenli County. The accident took place Tuesday, reported Xinhua.