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Katy Perry, Jason Derulo and Stevie Wonder were all there - but the only guest who got to give President Barack Obama a hug during his speech was restaurant owner Tim Harris. Harris has Down syndrome, but he owns his own restaurant and is a Special Olympics star in year-round sports. And the focus was more on the star athletes than on the pop stars at a White House event on Thursday to commemorate the anniversary of the Special Olympics organization. "Presidents need encouragement once in a while too...Thank you, Tim," Obama said after Harris left his seat during the president's remarks to give him a hug, Harris' trademark at his restaurant in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Established in 1968, the Special Olympics give people with intellectual disabilities opportunities to participate in sports ranging from basketball and bowling to figure skating and gymnastics. Obama and first lady Michelle Obama will serve as honorary chairs of the Special Olympics World Games i

Late pop singer Michael Jackson's Neverland estate is being considered for sale, a spokesman for the company controlling the property said on Friday. _0"> Owen Blicksilver, spokesman for investment firm Colony Capital LLC, said the company will make a decision soon as to whether it will place Jackson's estate near the central Californian coast on the market. He declined to reveal any further details. Jackson, who died in June 2009 at age 50 from an overdose of the powerful anesthetic propofol, had handed over the title on his Neverland ranch in 2008 to Colony Capital, which held his $23 million loan on the property. At the time of the deal, Colony Capital said the firm had been planning to spruce up the ranch and sell it for an estimated $70 million to $80 million or more if Jackson was able to revitalize his career. Jackson's estate, managed by John McClain and John Branca, said it is "saddened at the prospect of the sale of Neverland," and will con

French police arrested an officer on Saturday whom they suspect of stealing some 52 kg (115 pounds) of cocaine, worth around 2 million euros ($2.69 million), from a locked room inside central police headquarters in Paris. _0"> Police discovered on Friday that the cocaine, which was seized in a raid in July and then kept in a locker inside the headquarters overlooking the Seine river, had disappeared. Security camera footage helped investigators to identify a man entering the anti-drugs squad's quarters with two bags on the night of July 24 and leaving shortly after, police said in a statement. Other officers helped to identify the man as a member of the Paris anti-drugs unit and he was tracked down and arrested in southern France, the statement said. A police source said the officer, 30, had been arrested in the southern city of Perpignan, near the border with Spain, during a raid. It was the second time this year that the Paris police headquarters at 36 Quai des Orf

German police rescued an 83-year-old man pushing his bicycle in the middle of a motorway on Saturday after he gave up trying to cycle to Luxembourg to withdraw more than 100,000 euros ($134,300) from a bank there. _0"> The police in Schweich, near the western town of Trier, said they closed the high-speed A 602 motorway in both directions after the man was spotted pushing his bicycle there. Police said he told them he wanted to get the money out of his bank account before German tax authorities found out about it. The grand duchy is a preferred banking center for Germans trying to hide savings from taxation at home. Police said the man, who had been reported missing on Wednesday, was sent home in a taxi with his bicycle and the motorway was later re-opened. They declined to give any further information about the case. (Reporting by Erik Kirschbaum ; Editing by Tom Heneghan )

When luxury living quarter The Garden opens next year only a metal strip across the courtyard retracing the Berlin Wall will remind its affluent inhabitants that 25 years ago this was the "death strip" on no man's land separating east and west. Instead of barbed wire and sentries, residents will be greeted by a 24/7 doorman and concierge service - and perhaps eventually, a growing, city-wide pushback against gentrification. On the anniversary of the fall of the Wall in 1989, Berlin is belatedly attracting the kind of wealth normally associated with the capital of a major economic power. A fluke of history means the city has a supply of vacant lots in coveted central locations along the Wall built by East Germany's communists to keep capitalism at bay, though some developers are wary of being too brazenly commercial about this. "Clients, international and German alike, value living on historical ground," said Michael Ries of the property developer Pante

Supporters and opponents of the federal ban on marijuana took to the pages of The New York Times this weekend with full-page color advertisements that highlight the fast-evolving debate in the United States about medical and recreational drug use. The advertisements followed The New York Times' decision last month in a series of editorials to call for repealing the ban, the biggest U.S. newspaper to do so. Opinion polls show a majority of Americans now back the legalization of pot. The ads are also designed to undercut pot's decades-old association with the counterculture and drop-outs by featuring people dressed in everyday working attire. In an ad in Sunday's edition of the paper, Seattle-based Privateer Holdings features its medical marijuana website Leafly.com, which helps users to find pot dispensaries and to choose strains. The ad depicts a woman jogger in Spandex gliding past a brownstone building as a crisply dressed professional man stands atop its steps with

A Thai surrogate mother left with one twin by his Australian biological parents after the child was born with Down's Syndrome said on Sunday she was not informed of his condition until late in her pregnancy. Pattaramon Janbua said her doctors, the surrogacy agency and the baby's parents knew he was disabled at four months but did not inform her until the seventh month when the agency asked her - at the parents' request - to abort the disabled fetus. Pattaramon, 21, told Reuters Television she refused the abortion on religious grounds and carried both him and his twin sister to term six months ago. The parents, who have not been identified, took only the girl back with them to Australia. The boy, Gammy, needs surgery for a congenital heart condition, according to media reports. An online campaign in Australia had raised nearly A$200,000 ($186,200) in donations so far for the operation. "I want to warn those who are considering becoming a surrogate mother, don&

Japan's Panasonic Corp, best known for its television sets and home theater systems, wants to feed Singaporeans its radishes and lettuce. A unit of the electronics conglomerate last week started selling to a chain of Japanese restaurants in Singapore fresh produce grown in what it says is the first licensed indoor vegetable farm in the island state. The move ties Panasonic's deeper push into farming technology with land-scarce Singapore's ambition to reduce its near-total reliance on food imports. "We foresee agriculture to be a potential growth portfolio, given the global shortage of arable land, climate change and increasing demand for quality food as well as stable food supply," Hideki Baba, managing director of Panasonic Factory Solutions Asia Pacific, told reporters. The facility, which presently has a small production capacity of 3.6 tonnes annually, produces 10 types of vegetables such as mini red radishes and baby spinach. Indoor farming has found

The prospect of eating kale or Brussels sprouts might make some people gag, but a British company is hoping a hybrid mix of the two vegetables called "kalettes" will appeal to taste buds when they start to hit the broad U.S. market this fall. The tiny, curly-leafed purple and green sprouts are being promoted as the first major new vegetable product since broccolini, a cross between broccoli and the Chinese leaf vegetable kai-lan, was introduced in the United States in 1998. Though vitamin and mineral-packed kale has become trendy among health-conscious Americans, its marriage with Brussels sprouts in the United Kingdom was a product risk, said David Rogers, sales manager for Britain's Tozer Seeds, which created the hybrid after 15 years of research and development. "Kale for a long time has just been known as a sheep food, really," Rogers said of its reputation in Great Britain. "For a lot of people, the only time they'll eat Brussels sprouts is at

Biota Pharmaceuticals Inc said its influenza treatment failed to meet the main goal in a mid-stage study, about two months after the company lost a key government contract supporting the drug's development. _0"> Biota's shares fell as much as 29 percent to a record low of $2.29, making the stock one of the top percentage losers in early trade on the Nasdaq. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services told the company in April that it was pulling out of its contract to support the drug's development with up to $231 million in funding. The agency did not offer a reason for ending the contract. After losing the contract, Biota announced a restructuring plan that included cutting its workforce by about two-thirds and closing a facility in Melbourne, Australia. The long-acting drug, Laninamivir octanoate, is a neuraminidase inhibitor administered via inhalation. Neuraminidase inhibitors, like Roche Holding AG's Tamiflu and GlaxoSmithKline Plc's Relen

Smith & Nephew (S&N), Europe's largest maker of artificial joints, expects continued deal-making in the medical technology sector but has not come under pressure from investors to sell out, its chief executive said on Friday. Olivier Bohuon, who has eschewed a wave of mergers sweeping the industry, said S&N had a bright future as a standalone group after reporting improved second-quarter results that came in just ahead of analyst expectations. The British company is no stranger to bid talk, having been touted as a target, on and off, ever since receiving an approach from Unilever in 1968. But the deal rumors have lately grown louder, with a wave of U.S. healthcare companies now striving to move their tax bases abroad in a tactic known as "inversion". Reports that Stryker was considering such a move on S&N in May sent its shares surging, only for the U.S. rival to rule out bidding for six months. S&N shares were up again on Friday, gained 3.7 per

Yum Brands Inc on Friday said it would strengthen oversight of its China supply chain after it severed ties with supplier OSI China following a food safety scandal. _0"> Yum, which owns KFC and Pizza Hut restaurants in China, said on its microblog it would require suppliers to install monitoring equipment in their production facilities, improve scrutiny during unannounced visits and introduce an incentive system for whistleblowers. (Reporting by Brenda Goh and Samuel Shen; Editing by Stephen Coates)

A U.S. aid worker who was infected with the deadly Ebola virus while working in West Africa will be flown to the United States to be treated in a high-security ward at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta, hospital officials said on Thursday. The aid worker, whose name has not been released, will be moved in the next several days to a special isolation unit at Emory. The unit was set up in collaboration with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. CDC spokeswoman Barbara Reynolds said her agency was working with the U.S. State Department to facilitate the transfer. Reynolds said the CDC was not aware of any Ebola patient ever being treated in the United States, but five people in the past decade have entered the country with either Lassa Fever or Marburg Fever, hemorrhagic fevers similar to Ebola. News of the transfer follows reports of the declining health of two infected U.S. aid workers, Dr. Kent Brantly and missionary Nancy Writebol, who contracted Ebola while

For people plagued for years by mysterious illnesses, a new online service aims to help by “crowdsourcing” among medical professionals for a diagnosis. The service, called CrowdMed (www.crowdmed.com), relies on retired doctors, nurses and other “medical detectives” to help patients find answers to their hard-to-diagnose medical conditions. Jared Heyman, the founder of CrowdMed, told Reuters Health, “We’ve been live for 15 months, and more than 50 percent of our patients tell us that their case was successfully solved.” Heyman was inspired to launch CrowdMed after watching his sister suffer from a chronic undiagnosed medical condition and rack up nearly $100,000 in medical bills. Today CrowdMed has nearly 2,000 active medical detectives. The company claims its approach has so far helped solve more than 200 unique cases out of some 400 submissions that some patients say have “stumped” their doctors for years. Patients remain anonymous. They pay a $50 deposit to submit a case; the

Jenneh became a nurse in Sierra Leone 15 years ago with the hope of saving lives in one of the world's poorest countries. Now she fears for her own after three of her colleagues died of Ebola. Health workers like Jenneh are on the frontline of the battle against the world's worst ever outbreak of the deadly hemorrhagic fever that has killed 729 people in Sierra Leone, neighboring Liberia, Guinea and Nigeria so far. With West Africa's hospitals lacking trained staff, and international aid agencies already over stretched, the rising number of deaths among healthcare staff is shaking morale and undermining efforts to control the outbreak. More than 100 health workers have been infected by the viral disease, which has no known cure, including two American medics working for charity Samaritan's Purse. More than half of those have died, among them Sierra Leone's leading doctor in the fight against Ebola, Sheik Umar Khan, a national hero. "We're very worrie

A hospital in the French city of Clermont-Ferrand is to open a wine bar where terminally ill patients will be able to enjoy a "medically-supervised" glass or two with their families. _0"> "Why should we refuse the charms of the soil to those at the end of their lives? Nothing justifies such an prohibition," the Clermont-Ferrand University Hospital Center said in statement. The center's head, Dr. Virginie Guastella, said terminally ill patients had the right to "enjoy themselves". The bar will be the first in France to offer such a facility for patients and their families. Staff will be specially trained before it opens in the hospital's palliative care center in September. "Medically supervised tastings will help brighten what is often a difficult daily life," the hospital said. Although some researchers have long held that an antioxidant found in red wine is good for the heart, some recent research has determined that wine

The parents of preschool children in the U.S. may be buying fewer sugar-sweetened drinks, a new study suggests. Whether that will translate into lower childhood obesity rates remains to be seen, experts said. There was also a shift in milk purchasing, which some said could be concerning. Researchers examined purchases of packaged food and beverages among more than 42,000 households with children ages 2 to 5 years old. They found that between 2000 and 2011, purchased beverage calories dropped by 51 percent and purchased food calories dropped by 21 percent. Milk purchases decreased by 40 calories a day per person, soft drink purchases by 27 calories a day and juice drink purchases by 24 calories a day. In addition, daily purchases of grain-based desserts like cakes and cookies dropped by 24 calories, savory snacks by 17 calories and candy by 13 calories, according to results published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. The data came from a consumer panel that asks h

The U.S. Justice Department asked a federal appeals court on Friday to reconsider its July 22 ruling that poses a major setback to the Obamacare health insurance overhaul as it could limit the availability of federal health insurance subsidies for millions of people. In the ruling last month, the appeals court said the subsidies, which help people afford health insurance, may only be paid in states that have their own online health insurance exchanges. There are 36 states that lack their own exchanges, which are a central feature in the Obamacare system. Five million people could be affected, analysts have estimated, if subsidies were to disappear from the federally created marketplaces that have been set up in the states that did not set up their own exchanges. In the court filing, the government, as expected, asked the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to review the three-judge panel's decision. If the court agrees to rehear the case, oral a

Participating in a teen relationship abuse prevention program may equip and encourage high school coaches to intervene when they witness abusive behavior among athletes, according to a new study. Researchers previously showed that the program had a positive influence on male high school athletes, who showed reductions in perpetration of dating violence and increased intention to intervene and stop violence among peers. The program, called Coaching Boys Into Men (CBIM), trains coaches to deliver 15-minute scripted discussions once a week during the athletic season. The lessons highlight respect, nonviolence, sexual consent and interrupting abusive behaviors among peers. “The coaches gained as much from delivering the program as the athletes who received it,” said Maria Catrina D. Jaime, the study’s lead author from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center in Pennsylvania. “After the CBIM program, they were more confident addressing abusive behaviors among their athletes and

Sierra Leone has declared a state of emergency and called in troops to quarantine Ebola victims, joining neighboring Liberia in imposing controls as the death toll from the outbreak of the virus hit 729 in West Africa. The World Health Organisation said it would launch a $100 million response plan on Friday during a meeting with the affected nations in Guinea. It is in urgent talks with donors and international agencies to send more medical staff and resources to the region, it said. The WHO on Thursday reported 57 new deaths in the four days to July 27 in Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria, raising the death toll to 729. It said the number of Ebola cases had topped 1,300. "The scale of the Ebola outbreak, and the persistent threat it poses, requires WHO and Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone to take the response to a new level, and this will require increased resources," WHO Director General Margaret Chan said. Sierra Leone's president, Ernest Bai Koroma, anno

West African leaders agreed on Friday to take stronger measures to try to bring the worst outbreak of Ebola under control and prevent it spreading outside the region, including steps to isolate rural communities ravaged by the disease. The World Health Organization and medical charity Medicins Sans Frontieres said on Friday the outbreak, which has killed 729 people in four West African countries, was out of control and more resources were urgently needed to deal with it. WHO chief Margaret Chan told a meeting of the presidents of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone - the countries worst affected - that the epidemic was outpacing efforts to contain it and warned of catastrophic consequences in lost lives and economic disruption if the situation were allowed to deteriorate. "The presidents recognize the serious nature of the Ebola outbreak in their countries," Chan said after the meeting. "They are determined to take extraordinary measures to stop Ebola in their countrie

Express Scripts Holding Co, the largest U.S. pharmacy benefit manager, on Friday said it will remove 25 products from its 2015 list of preferred drugs, including anemia treatments Epogen and Aranesp, both sold by Amgen Inc. _0"> The company will continue to include Procrit, a similar anemia drug sold by Johnson & Johnson, on its list of preferred drugs, or formulary. "The products we have chosen to exclude from our formulary are those that cost significantly more than other available options but that fail to provide additional health benefit," the company said in an emailed statement. Express Scripts, which like other pharmacy benefit managers administers prescription drug benefits for employers and health plans and runs large mail-order pharmacies, said that patients who fill a prescription for an excluded drug will pay the full retail price. Epogen, and second-generation drug Aranesp, have been hugely profitable for Amgen, although their use has waned in r

Two American aid workers, both seriously ill after being infected with the deadly Ebola virus in Liberia, will be flown to the United States and treated in isolation at an Atlanta hospital, officials said on Friday. A plane equipped to transport Dr. Kent Brantly and missionary Nancy Writebol can carry only one patient back at a time, and Christian relief group Samaritan's Purse said it did not know who would return first. Both medical evacuations are due to be completed by early next week, said North Carolina-based Samaritan's Purse, as officials said bringing the stricken aid workers to the United States would not put the American public at risk. The two will be treated at Emory University Hospital primarily by a team of four infectious disease physicians. They will be able to see loved ones through a plate glass window and speak to those outside their rooms by phone or intercom. The patients are aid workers from Samaritan's Purse and missionary group SIM USA who we

U.S. laboratory inspectors charged with protecting the public from the release of deadly pathogens were repeatedly criticized by a federal watchdog for overlooking biosafety lapses long before this year's anthrax scare at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).     Newly released federal documents show that oversight gaps at the CDC Division of Select Agents and Toxins (DSAT) may have contributed to biosafety lapses at six laboratories handling pathogens including smallpox, influenza and monkeypox. As a result, the inspectors may have put public safety at risk.     "We found that DSAT did not effectively monitor and enforce certain federal select agent regulations at the laboratories," Daniel Levinson, inspector general for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said in a July 2011 report sent with a letter to CDC Director Dr. Thomas Frieden.     "These weaknesses may have contributed to the laboratories not being in full compliance

The first of two American aid workers infected with the deadly Ebola virus while in Liberia is set to arrive in the United States on Saturday to begin treatment in isolation at an Atlanta hospital, officials said. A plane equipped to transport Dr. Kent Brantly and missionary Nancy Writebol back to the country can carry only one patient back at a time and it was unclear early on Saturday which of the two would be arriving first. "We have learned that we will be receiving a patient with Ebola at Emory University Hospital on Saturday," Holly Korschun, spokeswoman for the facility where they will be treated, said late on Friday. "The second patient was going to follow in the next few days," she added. Despite alarm by some in the United States over the transport, health officials have said bringing the sickened aid workers into the country would not put the American public at risk. The patients were helping respond to the worst West African Ebola outbreak on recor

West African leaders agreed on Friday to take stronger measures to try to bring the worst outbreak of Ebola under control and prevent it spreading outside the region, including steps to isolate rural communities ravaged by the disease. The World Health Organization and medical charity Medicins Sans Frontieres said on Friday the outbreak, which has killed 729 people in four West African countries, was out of control and more resources were urgently needed to deal with it. WHO chief Margaret Chan told a meeting of the presidents of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone - the countries worst affected - that the epidemic was outpacing efforts to contain it and warned of catastrophic consequences in lost lives and economic disruption if the situation were allowed to deteriorate. "The presidents recognize the serious nature of the Ebola outbreak in their countries," Chan said after the meeting. "They are determined to take extraordinary measures to stop Ebola in their countrie

An American aid worker infected with the deadly Ebola virus while in Liberia arrived in the United States from West Africa on Saturday and walked into an Atlanta hospital, wearing a bio-hazard suit, for treatment in a special isolation unit. A chartered medical aircraft carrying Dr. Kent Brantly touched down at Dobbins Air Reserve Base in Marietta, Georgia, shortly before noon. Brantly was driven by ambulance, with police escort, to Emory University Hospital in Atlanta for treatment in a specially equipped room. Television news footage showed three people in white biohazard suits step gingerly out of the ambulance. Two of them walked into the hospital, one seeming to lean on the other for support. A hospital spokesman confirmed that Brantly walked into the building under his own power. Dr. Jay Varkey, an infectious disease specialist at Emory, said he could not comment on a treatment plan until Brantly had been evaluated. Since there is no known cure, standard procedures are to pr

Police in China have detained six executives of a meat supply company at the center of the latest food safety scare to hit the country, state media reported on Sunday. _0"> Shanghai's chief of police and deputy mayor Bai Shaokang told local radio that the executives of Shanghai Husi Food, a unit of U.S.-based OSI Group LLC, had been taken into custody, Xinhua news agency said. The firm had supplied meat to foreign fast food chains McDonald's and KFC-parent Yum Brands Inc, among many others. The scandal, which also dragged in coffee chain Starbucks Corp.O>, was triggered by a local television report showing staff at Shanghai Husi using long-expired meat. The report also alleged the firm forged production dates. Food safety has been a huge concern for Chinese consumers after dairy products tainted with the industrial chemical melamine sickened many thousands and led to the deaths of six infants in 2008. Regulators closed the Shanghai Husi plant on July 20. Poli