PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti - France’s national anthem blared across the tarmac on Wednesday as Nicolas Sarkozy made the first visit ever by a French president to Haiti, once his nation’s richest colony — offering aid to a country prostrate after a catastrophic earthquake.

Sarkozy promised $370 million over two years to support Haiti during its reconstruction and announced France’s decision to forgive Haiti of its $76 million in debt.

Moments earlier, Haitian President Rene Preval greeted the French president as a brass band played the Marseillaise to start a quick tour of the earthquake ravaged capital and a French field hospital.

Some Haitians are welcoming France’s new interest in their nation as a counterbalance to the United States, which has sent troops there three times in the past 16 years. But Sarkozy’s visit is also reviving bitter memories of the crippling costs of Haiti’s 1804 independence.

A third of the population was killed in an uprising against exceptionally brutal slavery, an international embargo was imposed to deter slave revolts elsewhere and 90 million pieces of gold were demanded by Paris from the world’s first black republic.

The debt hobbled Haiti, it seemed for life.

A country plagued by natural and unnatural calamities was desperately poor and mismanaged even before a magnitude-7 earthquake smashed up the capital Port-au-Prince on Jan. 12, killing more than 200,000 people and leaving more than a million homeless.

New era for relations?
Haitian politicians this week diplomatically skirted the question of French reparations — a demand put to Paris by ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 2004. That suggests Sarkozy’s four-hour visit could herald a new era.

French officials say Sarkozy will announce details of “a French plan for the reconstruction of Haiti” — if Haitian officials agree. It differs little from proposals from Haitian, U.S. and U.N. officials to decentralize power away from the devastated capital and boost agriculture and tourism.

The trip brings Sarkozy to an island where, French officials acknowledge, fascination with things French duels with strong, lingering resentments.

One official close to the French presidency, briefing reporters in Paris on condition of anonymity, hinted that France is not deaf to calls for reparations, calling Sarkozy’s visit “an occasion to show that France is mobilizing to give Haitians control of their destiny and pay past debts.”

France has already said it was canceling all of Haiti’s 56 million euro ( about $77 million) debt to Paris.

Repaying France for ‘lost property’
In 1825, crippled by the U.S.-led international embargo that was enforced by French warships, Haiti agreed to pay France 150 million francs in compensation for the lost “property” — including slaves — of French plantation owners.

By comparison, France sold the United States its immensely larger Louisiana Territory in 1803 for just 60 million francs. The amount for Haiti was later lowered to 90 million gold francs.

Haiti did not finish paying the debilitating debt — which was swollen by massive interest payments to French and American banks — until 1947.

But Haiti’s wealth already was destroyed. It had been the world’s richest colony, providing half the globe’s sugar and other exports including coffee, cotton, hardwood and indigo that exceeded the value of everything produced in the United States in 1788.

By the early 1780s, half of Haiti’s forests were gone, leading to the devastating erosion and extreme poverty that bedevils the country today.

France’s other former colonies in the region — Guadeloupe, Martinique, St. Martin, St. Barts and Guiana (in South America) — all have voted to remain part of France and send legislators to the French parliament.

Source (article): MSNBC

Source (picture): ENGLISH.PEOPLE, ENJOYFRANCE

BANGKOK - For the first time, an experimental vaccine has prevented infection with the AIDS virus, a watershed event in the deadly epidemic and a surprising result. Recent failures led many scientists to think such a vaccine might never be possible.

The vaccine cut the risk of becoming infected with HIV by more than 31 percent in the world’s largest AIDS vaccine trial of more than 16,000 volunteers in Thailand, researchers announced Thursday in Bangkok.

Even though the benefit is modest, “it’s the first evidence that we could have a safe and effective preventive vaccine,” Col. Jerome Kim said in a telephone interview. He helped lead the study for the U.S. Army, which sponsored it with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

The institute’s director, Dr. Anthony Fauci, warned that this is “not the end of the road,” but said he was surprised and very pleased by the outcome.

“It gives me cautious optimism about the possibility of improving this result” and developing a more effective AIDS vaccine, Fauci said in a telephone interview. “This is something that we can do.”

‘Historic milestone’
Even a marginally helpful vaccine could have a big impact. Every day, 7,500 people worldwide are newly infected with HIV; 2 million died of AIDS in 2007, the U.N. agency UNAIDS estimates.

“Today marks an historic milestone,” said Mitchell Warren, executive director of the AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition, an international group that has worked toward developing a vaccine.

“It will take time and resources to fully analyze and understand the data, but there is little doubt that this finding will energize and redirect the AIDS vaccine field,” he said in a statement.

The Thailand Ministry of Public Health conducted the study, which used strains of HIV common in Thailand. Whether such a vaccine would work against other strains in the U.S., Africa or elsewhere in the world is unknown, scientists stressed.

The study actually tested a two-vaccine combo in a “prime-boost” approach, where the first one primes the immune system to attack HIV and the second one strengthens the response.

They are ALVAC, from Sanofi Pasteur, the vaccine division of French drugmaker Sanofi-Aventis; and AIDSVAX, originally developed by VaxGen Inc. and now held by Global Solutions for Infectious Diseases, a nonprofit founded by some former VaxGen employees.

Source (article): MSNBC

Source (picture): HEALTHFREEDOMALLIANCE

Peggy Loper doesn’t know why, but she’s sure that the rapid hissed repetition of her favorite expletive somehow dulls the pain when she’s hammered her thumb rather than the nail she’d aimed for.

“Generally I start swearing even before the pain actually registers,” says the 48-year-old student from Salem, N.J. “And usually, the ouch-ouch dance, where I’m hopping from foot to foot, goes along with it. People have told me that I should try deep breathing, but I personally prefer to swear.” The F-bomb is her curse word of choice; that hard consonant at the end is particularly satisfying, she explains.

As it turns out, Loper may be right. British scientists have shown that swear words can have a powerful pain-killing effect, according to a new study published in the journal NeuroReport.

The researchers originally thought that swearing would make pain worse by focusing a person’s attention on the injury and its implications. To prove their hypothesis, they set up an experiment with 67 college students.

The students were asked to plunge their hands into frigid 41-degree Fahrenheit water for as long as they could stand the pain. Half were told to repeat their favorite curse word while their hands were submerged. The other half were asked to repeat a neutral word describing a table, such as solid or brown, while keeping their hands under water. Then the whole experiment was repeated with the two groups switching types of word. (Favorite swear words were, as you might guess, the ones starting with “F” and “S.” But since the subjects were British, the researchers also got an earful of “bollocks.”)

To the researchers’ surprise, the cursing group not only reported lower levels of pain, but also were able to keep their hands in the icy water longer. The men in the study, for example, were able to keep their hands in the water for an average of 190 seconds while swearing, but for only 140 seconds when uttering a neutral word.

The difference was even more pronounced in women. While men’s pain scores dropped by a point when they cussed, the women’s dropped by almost two full points.

The researchers aren’t sure why that might be, but the study’s lead author, Richard Stephens, has a theory. Women tend to swear less and that may make the words more powerful for them, says Stephens, a researcher in the school of psychology at Keele University in England.

Dr. Doris Cope, a pain researcher at the University of Pittsburgh, says the study findings make a lot of sense.

How much pain you feel when you stub your toe or hit your thumb with a hammer is a result both of the signals sent by the nerves in your body and of your mind’s interpretation of those signals, she explains.

And your mind can moderate those feelings of pain, says Cope, director of the university’s pain medicine program. The emotions let loose when you curse may somehow inhibit the pain response, because your brain gets distracted by the anger, she says.

Or it may simply be that cursing gives you a sense of control, Cope suggests. “You don’t feel the same level of helplessness. Studies have shown that when you give patients control over their own analgesia, they use less than when they have to depend on someone else to get pain relief.”

As for why cursing works better for women, Cope says: “That may be because cursing is a more emotionally laden activity for them,” she adds. “It might be interesting to take a population that swears as a matter of course — prisoners, say — and compare them to a group, such as nuns, who never swear.”

In the meantime, the study may just give the rest of us permission to just let go and explode with our favorite curse word when we bump our shins on the coffee table.

That would be fine by Stephens, “so long as there are no children around to hear you.”

Source (article): MSNBC

Source (picture): GHOTIERMAN

We’ve just learned Michael Jackson has died. He was 50.

Michael suffered a cardiac arrest earlier this afternoon at his Holmby Hills home and paramedics were unable to revive him. We’re told when paramedics arrived Jackson had no pulse and they never got a pulse back.

A source tells us Jackson was dead when paramedics arrived. A cardiologist at UCLA tells TMZ Jackson died of cardiac arrest.

Once at the hospital, the staff tried to resuscitate him but he was completely unresponsive.

A source inside the hospital told us there was “absolute chaos” after Jackson arrrived. People who were with the singer were screaming, “You’ve got to save him! You’ve got to save him!”

We’re told one of the staff members at Jackson’s home called 911.

La Toya ran in the hospital sobbing after Jackson was pronounced dead.

Michael is survived by three children: Michael Joseph Jackson, Jr., Paris Michael Katherine Jackson and Prince “Blanket” Michael Jackson II

SOURCE: TMZ

BOY dad Alfie Patten yesterday admitted he does not know how much nappies cost — but said: “I think it’s a lot.”

Baby-faced Alfie, who is 13 but looks more like eight, became a father four days ago when his girlfriend Chantelle Steadman gave birth to 7lb 3oz Maisie Roxanne.

He told how he and Chantelle, 15, decided against an abortion after discovering she was pregnant.

The shy lad, whose voice has not yet broken, said: “I thought it would be good to have a baby.

“I didn’t think about how we would afford it. I don’t really get pocket money. My dad sometimes gives me £10.”

Alfie, who is just 4ft tall, added: “When my mum found out, I thought I was going to get in trouble. We wanted to have the baby but were worried how people would react.

“I didn’t know what it would be like to be a dad. I will be good, though, and care for it.”

Alfie’s story, broken exclusively by The Sun today has sparked a huge political storm with Tory leader David Cameron saying: “When I saw these pictures this morning, I just thought how worrying that in Britain today children are having children.

“I hope that somehow these children grow up into responsible parents but the truth is parenthood is just not something they should be thinking about right now.”

Secret

PM Gordon Brown refused to comment directly on the story but said it was important that the Government did all it could to prevent teenage pregnancies.

Alfie’s dad Dennis yesterday told how the lad does not really understand the enormity of his situation — but seemed desperate to be a devoted and responsible father.

He wanted to be the first to hold Maisie after the hospital birth. He tenderly kisses the baby and gives her a bottle.

And Dennis, 45, said: “He could have shrugged his shoulders and sat at home on his Playstation. But he has been at the hospital every day.”

Maisie was conceived after Chantelle and Alfie — just 12 at the time — had a single night of unprotected sex.

They found out about the baby when Chantelle was 12 weeks pregnant.

But they kept it a secret until six weeks later when Chantelle’s mum Penny, 38, became suspicious about her weight gain and confronted her.

After that Alfie’s family told only those closest to them for fear he would be “demonised” at school.

Chantelle gave birth to Maisie on Monday night after a five-hour labour at Eastbourne Hospital, East Sussex.

Last night she told The Sun: “I’m tired after the birth. I was nervous after going into labour but otherwise I was quite excited.”

Chantelle told how she discovered she was expecting after going to her GP with “really bad” stomach pains. She said: “Me and Alfie went. The doctor asked me whether we had sex. I said yes and he said I should do a pregnancy test. He did the test and said I was pregnant. I started crying and didn’t know what to do.

“He said I should tell my mum but I was too scared.

“We didn’t think we would need help from our parents. You don’t really think about that when you find out you are pregnant. You just think your parents will kill you.”

But Penny figured out what was going on after buying Chantelle a T-shirt which revealed her swelling tum.

Chantelle admitted she and Alfie — who are both being supported by their parents — would be accused of being grossly irresponsible. She said: “We know we made a mistake but I wouldn’t change it now. We will be good loving parents.

“I have started a church course and I am going to do work experience helping other young mums.

“I’ll be a great mum and Alfie will be a great dad.”

Chantelle and Maisie were released from hospital yesterday. They are living with Penny, Chantelle’s jobless dad Steve, 43, and her five brothers in a rented council house in Eastbourne. The family live on benefits. Alfie, who lives on an estate across town with mum Nicola, 43, spends most of his time at the Steadmans’ house.

He is allowed to stay overnight and even has a school uniform there so he can go straight to his classes in the morning.

Alfie’s dad, who is separated from Nicola, believes the lad is scared deep down.

He said: “Everyone is telling him things and it’s going round in his head. It hasn’t really dawned on him. He hasn’t got a clue of what the baby means and can’t explain how he feels. All he knows is mum and dad will help.

“When you mention money his eyes look away. And she is reliant on her mum and dad. It’s crazy. They have no idea what lies ahead.”

Dennis, who works for a vehicle recovery firm, described Alfie as “a typical 13-year-old boy”.

He said: “He loves computer games, boxing and Manchester United.” Dennis, who has fathered nine kids, told how he was “gobsmacked” when he discovered Alfie was to be a dad, too.

He said: “When I spoke to him he started crying. He said it was the first time he’d had sex, that he didn’t know what he was doing and of the complications that could come.

“I will talk to him again and it will be the birds and the bees talk. Some may say it’s too late but he needs to understand so there is not another baby.”

Lovely

Chantelle’s mum said: “I told her it was lovely to have the baby but I wish it was in different circumstances. We have five children already so it’s a big financial responsibility. But we are a family and will pull together and get through.

“She’s my daughter. I love her and she will want for nothing.”

Last night Michaela Aston, of the anti-abortion Christian charity LIFE, said: “We commend these teenagers for their courage in bringing their child into the world.

“At the same time this is symptomatic of the over-sexualisation of our youngsters and shows the policy of value-free sex education just isn’t working.”

Today Sussex Police and the local council’s children services said they have investigated the case and pledged continued support for the young parents.

Britain’s youngest known father is Sean Stewart. He became a dad at 12 when the girl next door, 15-year-old Emma Webster, gave birth in Sharnbrook, Bedford, in 1998. They split six months later.

Source (article): THESUN

Source (pictures): THESUN