Linda Young – AHN News Writer
Washington, DC, United States (AHN) – Initial jobless claims for the week ending Jan. 21 rose by 21,000 to 377,000, compared with the previous week’s revised figure of 356,000, the U.S. Department of Labor said. The less volatile four-week moving average was 377,500, a drop of 2,500 from the previous week’s revised average of 380,000. DOL figures show that the total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending Jan. 7, the most recent week for which such data is available, was 7,638,233, down by 188,612 people from [...] Continue Reading…

Diane Alter – AHN News Reporter
Washington, D.C., United States (AHN) – The U.S. government on Wednesday released new nutrition standards for school meals that mandate dramatic changes. Among the changes, sodium will be slashed, calories will be cut and students will be offered a wider variety and larger portions of fruits and vegetables. These changes raise the nutrition standards for school meals for the first time in more than 15 years. The quality of school menus have been the subject of some heated debates for years. Sparking the debates is the growing number of overweight or obese [...] Continue Reading…

United States (KaiserHealth) – The latest casualty of the Great Recession may soon be the nation’s elderly. Cuts in government payments for patient care and less construction of new nursing homes are already taking a toll. Add to this the aging baby boom generation and you have a worst-case scenario in which older people who need full-time care won’t be able to get it. “We believe we’re at a tipping point,” says Mark Parkinson, head of the American Health Care Association (AHCA), which represents nursing homes. If so, the timing couldn’t be worse. The first baby boomers hit [...] Continue Reading…

Linda Young – AHN News Writer
London, United Kingdom (AHN) – The outlook for the global labor market is worse for 2012 than it was in 2011 when one in three workers or an estimated 1.1 billion people, either were unemployed or living in poverty, the International Labour Organization (ILO) says. Findings came from its annual Global Employment Trends 2012 report released this week. ILO officials said they were more pessimistic because three years of crisis conditions in the global labor market have created a weaker global economy. The ILO called on governments to do more to create [...] Continue Reading…

Juba, South Sudan (IRIN) – A small fridge in the corner of Juba Teaching Hospital’s laboratory is the only blood bank in South Sudan, the world’s newest nation with some of the worst health statistics in the world. Health workers say a lack of blood is the main cause of mortality at the country’s main but extremely under-resourced hospital, and they face the anguish of having to watch patients who could be saved die. “Sometimes they bleed until they die and we cannot do anything about it,” said Wani Mena, head of the hospital. “The first cause, [...] Continue Reading…

Schenectady, NY, United States (AHN) – Price Chopper Supermarkets is issuing a voluntary recall on its 16-ounce Coyote Joe’s Shredded Taco Cheese with UPC 41735-12509 and an expiration date of April 21, 2012, due to the possibility of shredded plastic fragments inside the packaging. The cheese was sold chain-wide between the dates of Jan. 4 and Jan. 17, 2012. Price Chopper has initiated its Smart Reply notification program, which uses purchase data and consumer phone numbers on file in connection with the company’s AdvantEdge loyalty card to alert households that may have purchased the product. Customers [...] Continue Reading…

Washington, DC, United States (KaiserHealth) – The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has gathered scientists and tobacco policy experts to study the potential health risks and benefits of dissolvable tobacco products. The Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee met this week and advocates from all sides lined up to give their pitch to the FDA panel. Dissolvables, which are made with finely milled tobacco, aren’t new, but they drew new attention last year when R.J. Reynolds and Philip Morris introduced new flavors and varieties in a few cities across the country. Some health officials and lawmakers dubbed the flavored [...] Continue Reading…

Linda Young – AHN News Writer
Washington, DC, United States (AHN) – Initial unemployment claims dropped to 352,000 during the week ending Jan. 14, their lowest level in nearly four years. First time claims for jobless benefits dropped by 50,000 from the previous week’s revised tally of 402,000, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. The less volatile four-week moving average was 379,000, a decrease of 3,500 from the previous week’s revised average of 382,500. However, the advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate also dropped. Only 2.7 percent of jobless workers were covered by unemployment insurance for [...] Continue Reading…

Tejinder Singh – AHN News Correspondent
Washington, D.C., United States (AHN) – U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday refused to buckle under Republican deadline and rejected a bid to expand the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline according to the Obama Administration. President Obama personally conveyed “his Administration’s decision on the Keystone pipeline,” to Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper according to the White House but media reports from across the border noted the disappointment of Canadian leader. In an email statement Obama justified the denial as “not a judgment on the merits of the pipeline, but the arbitrary nature [...] Continue Reading…

The Media Line Staff
Jerusalem, Israel Felice Friedson and Arieh – Israel Edri is a young Israeli ultra-Orthodox man. He’d like to spend all his day in religious studies. But as the father of two children and a third on the way, life’s challenges have stepped in and today he works in telemarketing. “Reality hit. If you ask me I’d like to sit and study all day long, but the reality is that you have to get out and work, especially if you want to live in an expensive city like Jerusalem and give your kids what they need,” [...] Continue Reading…