This article is from the BBC News website. � British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/world-africa-12102333
Carlena Marona Reuben Porteus An Huisinga Randell Blechinger
Edinburgh is staging four days of events to celebrate the new year Preparations for open air Hogmanay celebrations are well under way in cities across Scotland.
In Edinburgh 80,000 are expected to gather for the party on Princes Street to see in the New Year.
Glasgow is hosting a ceilidh in George Square, open only to ticket holders, followed by a fireworks display.
Inverness is preparing for a huge free party at the Northern Meeting Park Arena, with the Red Hot Chilli Pipers, Peatbog Fairies and Blazin Fiddles.
Aberdeen city council has organised a free fireworks display from the roof of His Majesty's Theatre at midnight.
Hundreds of people are also expected to attend Stonehaven's annual fireballs ceremony.
Stirling Castle's event, which features singers including Wagner Carrilho from the X Factor, ends with the city's "biggest ever" hogmanay fireworks display at midnight.
A piper will play at the Midsteeple in Dumfries from 2345 to 0015 GMT and revellers are expected to gather for the bells at midnight.
The events are a draw to tourists from around the world and a boost to the Scottish economy.
More than 25,000 people took part in a torchlight procession on Thursday According to the Scottish government, Edinburgh's Hogmanay alone generated an estimated £29m in 2009.
More than 25,000 people took part in a torchlight procession in Edinburgh on Thursday evening to kick off the city's New Year festival in the capital.
The event, which started at Parliament Square, marked the beginning of a four-day celebration.
Organisers said the numbers of people attending Thursday night's event had been "record-breaking".
The city's main Hogmanay ticket events, including an open air concert starring Biffy Clyro, begin at 2100 GMT.
Edinburgh's emergency services and the city council have issued a number of guidelines warning revellers to stay safe, be sensible and keep warm and dry during the celebrations.
This article is from the BBC News website. � British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-12098734
Ardelle Maceachern Malik Simplot Apolonia Loera Noah Brunjes
Hester van Yperen and Maurice A debate is raging in the Netherlands about where women should give birth.
It is the country which has always had the highest rate of home birth in Europe - although the figure has dropped from 34% of births to 24% during the past decade.
The decline has been particularly dramatic in the past two years.
Media reports have raised questions about the safety of home births. Some experts say these are scare stories though.
On a maternity ward in a big Amsterdam hospital, the OLVG, health journalist Hester van Yperen is proudly holding her son Maurice.
He was born by Caesarian section three days earlier. The operation was planned because Maurice was in the breech position.
Hester, 37, has reported on the safety of home births for the Dutch TV channel, RTL.
From her hospital bed, she told me why she'd never wanted to give birth at home.
She said: "Dutch women grow up thinking home birth is good for you, and that it's part of mother nature.
"But I didn't consider it at all. I think it's too risky. If something is wrong, it's better to be in hospital."
The Dutch government has described as "worrying" the fact that the rate of death among newborn babies is higher than in other European countries.
The health minister said recently that obstetric care needed to improve, and there was sometimes "insufficient communication" between professionals.
Eke Ut Mannetje and daughter Santje Some doctors say women are choosing hospital birth because they want a full range of pain relief and quicker deliveries.
In the peaceful commuter town of Soest, it is easy to find women who hold dear the Dutch culture of a high rate of home birth.
Eke Ut Mannetje has delivered all three of her children at home.
Eke said: "You have all the bacteria and ill people in hospital. Emotionally, you want to hide in surroundings that you know and have comfort when giving birth. For me, being at home was perfect.
"The birth of my first daughter, Sient, who's now seven, went really quickly. We lived on a fourth floor home in Amsterdam at the time.
"The midwife had to run to get to me in time. We lived close to the hospital - but she said if there were complications, I'd have to stay horizontal and the firemen would have to get me out of the window. I was glad that wasn't the case!"
Christine Coenen delivered her daughters Fean, 10, and six-year-old Do in hospital - although she would have preferred home birth. It was what her own mother had done with 10 children.
But Do was three weeks late in arriving. Christine was suddenly rushed to hospital with contractions.
The placenta was late in being delivered, and she lost a lot of blood.
Christine said: "There is no guarantee you won't have complications at home - but I know from experience that there's also no guarantee you won't have complications in hospital either.
"What happened to me was one big disaster. It's not nice being driven to hospital while having contractions and being in pain."
Professor Gerry Visser One unique feature of the Dutch system is a network of maternity nurses called Kraamhulp.
They assist midwives during the birth, help new mothers begin breastfeeding and provide vital back-up during the crucial first week with maternity care and even housework.
One of them, Sylvia Dorrestein, told me: "It's emotional and intensive but also a really nice job. I've been doing this for 15 years.
"You have to learn how to raise a child in the home - not in hospital."
But critics of the system say it has been too hesitant in considering risk.
The charge is being led by Professor Gerry Visser, an obstetrician at Utrecht Medical Centre.
He said: "There's been this mentality of 'don't be too aggressive - they're healthy women - it can't be too serious'. Generally that's correct - but not always.
Professor Simone Buitendijk Midwifery expert“Even if we totally abolished home births, we wouldn't make a dent in the mortality statistics. ”
"The rate of intervention here is too low. We fell asleep. And now the higher mortality data has given us something of a crisis."
Last year in the Netherlands, there were around 1,700 stillbirths and deaths among newborn babies.
Everyone agrees that figure is too high, and that Dutch midwives and doctors should work more closely together.
But are home births being unfairly blamed?
Professor Simone Buitendijk leads midwives' training and researches the Dutch maternity system and international mortality rates. She is dismayed at the recent drop in home births.
She said: "Thirty of those 1,700 deaths were after the mother started to give birth at home - and not all of those 30 are avoidable.
"Home births are safe. Even if we totally abolished them, we wouldn't make a small dent in the mortality statistics.
"It's very short-sighted. I think it would be really sad if choice disappears - and there's a real risk of this happening in the Netherlands.
"It has nothing to do with a painting over the bed, or a nice soft light in the corner. Home birth for women is the best possible way of being properly in control. It's so elementary and important."
This article is from the BBC News website. � British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/health-12043693
This article is from the BBC News website. � British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/sport1/hi/football/eng_div_1/9322922.stm
Turkey and celery square anyone? Christmas dinner traditionally centres on the turkey or goose. But if US scientists have their way, everyone may be sitting around a printer.
The team at Cornell University's Computational Synthesis Lab (CCSL) are building a 3D food printer, as part of the bigger Fab@home project, which they hope one day will be as commonplace as the microwave oven or blender.
Just pop the raw food "inks" in the top, load the recipe - or 'FabApp' - and the machine would do the rest.
"FabApps would allow you to tweak your foods taste, texture and other properties," says Dr Jeffrey Ian Lipton, who leads the project.
"Maybe you really love biscuits, but want them extra flaky. You would change the slider and the recipe and the instructions would adjust accordingly."
The goal is to blow the lid off cooking as we know it and change the future of food production.
People lacking even basic culinary skills could download the recipe files of master chefs or print out nutrition-packed dishes recommended by their doctors.
Chefs could also create new foodstuffs and customizable menus for fussy customers.
And it would have the added benefit of cutting out some of the waste of current food production methods, says Homaro Cantu, chef and owner of the Moto Restaurant in Chicago, Illinois, who has printed sushi using an ink jet printer.
"Imagine being able to essentially 'grow', 'cook' or prepare foods without the negative industrial impact - everything from fertilizers to saute pans and even packaging," he says.
"The production chain requirements for food would nearly be eliminated."
Local food, could really mean local.
"You can imagine a 3D printer making homemade apple pie without the need for farming the apples, fertilizing, transporting, refrigerating, packaging, fabricating, cooking, serving and the need for all of the materials in these processes like cars, trucks, pans, coolers, etc," he adds.
While other researchers have toyed with the idea of printing food - notably at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology - the Fab@home team is actively working on creating an affordable syringe-based 3D printer that can print a wide variety of foods.
The current design is basically a series of precise syringes that deposits food inks line by line, and layer by layer, according to an electronic blueprint.
Ingredients: 220g of unsalted butter; 110g icing sugar; 3 egg yolks; and 330g of flour
Vital kit: 3D food printer, cooker, freezer
Time: 30 minutes
Method
• Mix the butter until fluffy.
• Slowly add icing sugar in batches of no more than 20g (0.7oz)
• Add egg yolks one at a time
• Add flavor and color additives as desired
• Add flour in 6.6g (0.23oz) batches until desired consistency is reached
• Print cookies using a Fab@Home 3D printer in desired shape
• Freeze for one hour for dough to firm up before baking
• Initially bake at 200C (400 Farenheit) to allow the cookies to set; once they start to brown, shift to 175C (350 Farenheit) until golden
• Store extra dough in moisture tight container to maintain print-ability.
The blueprint specifies exactly what materials go where and are currently drawn up using traditional engineering computer aided design (CAD) software.
"In the future there would probably be a kind of 'ChefCAD' that will allow people to design their own food constructions," said Professor Hod Lipson, Director of CCSL.
"You'd hit the print button and it would ask you how many copies," said Prof Lipson.
The raw materials used to print the food are currently limited to anything that can be extruded from a syringe. Commonly they are liquid or melted versions of ingredients, including chocolate, cookie dough, cheese, or cake batter.
However, the team are now experimenting with mixing foods with hydrocolloids - substances that form gels with water, generally used to thicken food products - to create a range of basic liquid ingredients.
They also recognize that people will want to create their own inks, allowing everyone to become Willy Wonka.
This creates its own problems.
"Each material will behave differently," says Dr Lipton.
The solution would be to create a machine that constantly examines what it is printing, tweaking the design and mixture of raw ingredients as it goes.
"I feel like both approaches will be used going forward," he says. "In situations where you want complete control over the food intact and properties - hospitals, space flight, personal dieting - people will use the hydrocolloids approach.
MMmmmm When doing home cooking you want to be able to use your own hand-made ingredients and feedback will be the only solution."
The team has already had some success with their prototypes, creating cookies with embedded letters and designer domes made of turkey meat.
They hope to make their designs and ingredients list more complex, and able to handle food that people want to eat.
"Imagine if the microwave oven worked only with frozen pre cooked hot dogs when it first came out - no one would have them now," says Dr Lipton.
Long-term, the team believes that people will take to the technology by creating their own 3D printable food recipe social networks with everyone improving on each other's creations.
"3D printing will do for food what e-mail and instant messaging did for communication," says Mr Cantu.
"What if you could have mom's homemade apple pie sent via e-mail and printed up at home? Her apple pie becomes as close as an instant message on Facebook."
This article is from the BBC News website. � British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/technology-12069495
Reynaldo Siciliano Johana Zoltek Alexis Montonez Yetta Schorr
A record number of organ transplants were carried out in the UK last year In asking new drivers whether they wish to join the organ donor register, the government is attempting to reduce the gap between those believed to want to donate their organs and those who actually commit to doing so.
The move has been widely welcomed but, for some, it does not go far enough.
The NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) service believes it will make an often difficult decision for relatives much easier.
It says 90% of people support organ donation despite only 27% of the UK population being registered donors.
Since many people do not inform family members of their wish to donate their organs, sometimes relatives opt not to give consent.
Paula Aubrey, team manager for the NHSBT's London Organ Donation Services Team, said: "We know from practical work if the relatives know the person who has died wanted to donate organs it makes the decision so much easier for them.
"What we know in the UK is a lot of people want to donate their organs but just don't get round to signing up.
"We have no margin to miss any person who would want to donate."
Under the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency's "prompted choice" system, applicants will either have to register to donate, say they have already signed up, or select an option which states they do not wish to answer the question.
Between 1 April 2009 and 31 March 2010:
3,709 organ transplants were carried out in the UKThe organs were donated by 2,021 people978 lives were saved through a heart, lung, liver or combined heart/lungs, liver/kidney, liver/pancreas or heart/kidney transplant3,099 people had their sight restored through a cornea transplantAlmost one million more people added their names to the NHS organ donor registerIn September, the number of people on the register had reached 17.4 millionSource: NHSBT
The existing system allows applicants to skip the question completely.
The British Medical Association (BMA) has backed the planned revision, calling it a step in the right direction, but the body is also among those pushing for bolder action.
The BMA would like to see a system of presumed consent, where the assumption would be made that all people wish to donate their organs unless they have chosen to opt out.
It wants donation to become the default position and says "public support for such a change is growing but we need to continue to raise awareness and encourage public debate".
Dr Tony Calland, chairman of the BMA's ethics committee, is pressing for a system of "soft presumed consent" where organs would only not be used if there was "extremely strong" opposition from relatives.
Similar systems have been introduced in other countries, with varying degrees of success, he said.
"Austria and Spain are the two main ones that have a system of presumed consent and it seems to work really well there," Dr Calland said.
Prompted choice schemes in the United States have also increased donor registrations significantly.
But Dr Calland added that in countries where governments had failed to educate people sufficiently about the measures, and where issues such as religious beliefs were more of a factor, there had been problems.
Dr Evan Harris Former Lib Dem MP“I think ethically the default should be to save lives”
"In Brazil they introduced presumed consent overnight and people weren't informed, they didn't understand it… and the whole thing was such a disaster that it was withdrawn and changed back again after a relatively short period of time," he said.
In 2008, the Organ Donation Taskforce said a 50% increase in organ donation was achievable in the UK within five years, but it stopped short of recommending an opt-out system.
The British Heart Foundation (BHF) called the driving licence pilot "a welcome step forward", but it too is warning that it will not solve the shortage of organs.
Betty McBride, director of policy and communications at the BHF, said: "We believe an opt-out system should underpin organ donation.
"This would ensure that there are many more organ donors available and ultimately save lives."
Dr Evan Harris, a former Liberal Democrat MP for Oxford West and Abingdon and a former hospital doctor, said the prompted choice pilot would still allow people to "skip the question" of donating their organs by selecting the "I do not want to answer this now" option.
He is another fan of an opt-out system, which he says has "every possible advantage".
"I think ethically the default should be to save lives.
"It's not difficult to convince people to go on the organ donor register when you sit down and talk to them.
"But I think most people don't like to talk about their own mortality. People are willing to donate but aren't necessarily willing to think about it."
Dr Harris said increasingly relatives were refusing to allow organs to be used because they wrongly assumed their loved one did not wish to be a donor.
"If relatives find their loved one is not on the register they just think 'well he mustn't have wanted to'," he said.
This article is from the BBC News website. � British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/health-12097992
This article is from the BBC News website. � British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/int/news/-/news/world-asia-pacific-12099102
Janice Russe Reynaldo Siciliano Johana Zoltek Alexis Montonez
