Month: February 2014

The Vatican sought to defuse tensions with the United Nations on Friday after a damning report which accused the church of covering up child sex abuse by priests. Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi adopted a markedly softer tone to Wednesday's sharp criticism of a report by the U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child. The Vatican had originally planned a muted response, according to a person familiar with the matter, but attacked the report's demands that the church scale back its opposition to abortion, artificial contraception and homosexuality. The exchange appeared to leave the church and the United Nations heading for their biggest clash in decades but Lombardi said there was no rift with the world body.

Most research has linked high sodium consumption with greater risks of stroke and cardiovascular disease. The data “weren’t entirely convincing,” said Nancy Cook, lead author of the current study published in the journal Circulation, and a member of that expert panel. Cook is a statistician at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston. The TOHP followed the field’s “gold-standard” technique of measuring salt consumption in 24-hour urine samples.

Chile's CFR Pharmaceuticals dropped its $1.2 billion bid for South African drugmaker Adcock Ingram on Friday, thwarted by Adcock's top shareholder Bidvest in its attempt to get into fast-growing African markets. The widely expected defeat puts attention back on Bidvest and its chief executive Brian Joffe, who wants to add Adcock's portfolio of painkillers to an investment conglomerate that spans shipping to mop sales. But its higher cash and shares offer required approval from shareholders with 75 percent of Adcock and was effectively blocked when Bidvest raised its stake to over 34.5 percent at the end of last month – following a one-day buying spree that saw a record 39 million Adcock shares changing hands. Shares in Adcock, which tumbled at the end of January after the announcement that Bidvest had acquired enough shares to block CFR, were little changed at 59.65 rand at 1340 GMT, well below Bidvest's cash offer of 70 rand.

… of studying all things diet and weight loss, there are certain facts about food … the bulk or nutrition that you need for good health and weight control.

SOCHI, Russia (AP) — U.S. Olympians will have to make do without the team's official yogurt — depriving them of a source of protein and potentially disturbing their daily routines as they prepare for the biggest competition of their lives.