British Leader Sees Wider Threat in Algeria Attack


Oli Scarff/Getty Images


Prime Minister David Cameron en route to Parliament to deliver a statement on the Algeria hostage crisis.







LONDON — With more than 60 hostages still missing and many feared dead, Prime Minister David Cameron told Parliament on Friday that the Qaeda-linked attack on a remote Algerian gas installation demonstrated the need for Britain and its Western allies, including the United States, to direct more of their diplomatic, military and intelligence resources to the intensifying threat emanating from “the ungoverned space” of the North African desert, treating it with as much concern as the terrorist challenge in Pakistan and Afghanistan.




Mr. Cameron offered little new information about the showdown at the In Amenas plant, nearly 1,000 miles from Algiers, the Algerian capital, in the oil-and-gas-rich emptiness of the Sahara, saying the information reaching London about what he described as a “continuing situation” remained sketchy. He added that Britain learned overnight that the number of British citizens caught up in the hostage-taking and the subsequent shootout was “significantly” fewer than the 30 people feared on Thursday. As part of the effort to learn more, he said, a special plane had been assigned to carry Britain’s ambassador in Algiers and other British diplomats to the area of the gas plant on Friday.


But in an hourlong session in the House of Commons, Mr. Cameron pointed to the somber implications of underestimating recent events in Mali and Algeria as a regional problem for North Africa rather than as an increasingly fertile arena for Islamic militants and their hostility to the West. He said he had discussed his concerns in a telephone conversation with President Obama on Thursday.


The British leader said the growth of Islamic terrorist networks in the countries of the Sahel, the broad area of North Africa that runs more than 3,000 miles from Mauritania in the west to Sudan and Somalia in the east, should be a renewed focus of Western counterterrorist concerns and resources. At one point, he said military assistance to the affected countries needed to be part of NATO military planning, though he again emphatically ruled out any British combat role in support of France’s campaign against militants in Mali.


Pointing to the leading role played in the Algerian attack by Mokhtar Belmokhtar, a terrorist ringleader and smuggler with links to North Africa’s main Islamic terrorist group, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, Mr. Cameron warned that the Algerian attack was symptomatic of a far broader threat.


“What we know is that the terrorist threat in the Sahel comes from Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, which aspires to establish Islamic law across the Sahel and northern Africa, and to attack Western interests in the region and, frankly, wherever it can,” Mr. Cameron said. “Just as we have reduced the scale of the Al Qaeda threat in other parts of the world, including in Pakistan and Afghanistan, so it has grown in other parts of the world. We need to be equally concerned about that, and equally focused on it.”


To some British commentators, Mr. Cameron’s remarks sounded like an effort to prompt the United States to become more deeply involved in North African security matters. In the 2011 Libyan conflict, the United States stepped back from the lead role it has traditionally taken in NATO military operations and left Britain, France and Italy to conduct the bulk of the bombing in support of the Libyan rebels’ successful campaign to topple Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.


Since then, high-ranking British officials have expressed concerns that the Obama administration is stepping back from European political and security issues and turning its attentions increasingly to the nations of the Pacific.


With the approach of Mr. Obama’s second inauguration on Sunday, The Spectator, a London-based weekly that is influential in Mr. Cameron’s Conservative Party, devoted its cover this week to an article headlined “The Pacific President,” and an illustration showing Mr. Obama in a brightly colored Hawaiian shirt and shorts surfing off a palm-lined beach. “As Barack Obama is sworn in again as president, his allies in the West will ask themselves the same nervous question they posed four years ago: how much does he care about us?” the accompanying article asked.


White House officials said on Thursday that Mr. Obama had used his telephone conversation with Mr. Cameron to underscore American concerns that Britain remain a robust force within the 27-nation European Union, a hot-button issue for Mr. Cameron. The prime minister had planned — then canceled, amid the Algerian crisis — a landmark speech in Amsterdam on Friday in which he was to have outlined his plan to negotiate a much sparer role for Britain in the European bloc.


In his remarks to lawmakers on Friday, Mr. Cameron offered what could have been construed as an oblique riposte to Mr. Obama, or at least to officials in the Obama administration who have urged that Europe take greater responsibility for confronting terrorist and other security threats at its own doorstep.  He may also have been addressing domestic critics in Britain, or other NATO countries that have been less active than Britain in counterterrorism efforts aimed at confronting the spread of Islamic militant groups.


“There is a great need for not just Britain but other countries to give a priority to understanding better, and working better, with the countries in this region,” he said. “Those who believe that there is a terrorist, extremist Al Qaeda problem in parts of north Africa, but that it is a problem for those places and we can somehow back off and ignore it, are profoundly wrong. That is a problem for those places, and for us.”


Mr. Cameron noted that Britain had been “the first country in the world” to offer France military assistance in its campaign in Mali, deploying one of the largest military transport aircraft it has, an American-made C-17 Globemaster, to ferry French troops and military equipment to Bamako, the Malian capital. He said it was time for Britain and France to move beyond their spheres of influence in Africa dating back to the colonial era, “and recognize that is in our interest to boost the capacity of all African states” confronted by the terrorist threat.


This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: January 18, 2013

An earlier version of this article misstated the year that Libyan rebels overthrew Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi. It was 2011, not last year.



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Intel’s revenue forecast short of expectations






SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Intel Corp forecast current-quarter revenue that was slightly below expectations as the personal computer industry grapples with falling sales and a shift toward tablets and smartphones.


PC makers are struggling to stop a decline in sales as consumers hold off on buying new laptops in favor of spending on more nimble mobile gadgets.






Microsoft Corp‘s long-awaited launch of Windows 8 in October brought touchscreen features to laptops but failed to spark a resurgence in sales that Intel and many PC manufacturers had hoped for.


Intel said its capital spending in 2013 would be $ 13 billion, plus or minus $ 500 million, exceeding what many analysts had expected.


In the fourth quarter, Intel’s revenue was $ 13.5 billion, compared with $ 13.9 billion a year earlier. Analysts had expected $ 13.53 billion in revenue for the fourth quarter, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.


Intel estimated first-quarter revenue of $ 12.7 billion, plus or minus $ 500 million. Analysts expected $ 12.91 billion for the current quarter.


Net earnings in the December quarter were $ 2.5 billion, or 48 cents a share, compared with $ 3.4 billion, or 64 cents a share, in the same quarter last year.


(Reporting by Noel Randewich; Editing by Richard Chang)


Gadgets News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Britney Spears & Jason Trawick Split: Will She Be Okay?















01/17/2013 at 04:45 PM EST







Britney Spears and Jason Trawick


Michael Kovac/Getty


The new year has already been full of change for Britney Spears.

"She's left her gig as judge on The X Factor, her new puppy Hannah is gravely ill, and on Jan. 11 she announced she and fiancé Jason Trawick, 41, have called it quits after more than three years together.

While Spears, 31, told PEOPLE in an exclusive statement, "I'll always adore him, and we will remain great friends," a family source says the signer is "definitely upset about the split."

What tore the couple apart? Spears, who has two sons with ex-husband Kevin Federline, had hoped to start a family soon with Trawick, but he wasn't ready. Says the close source: "There were so many issues he wanted worked out before that" – including her neediness. "It was difficult for Jason to have his own life."

Adds an insider: "Britney is very insecure and has had a lot of trouble with jealousy." These insecurities may be heightened now. "[She] is very worried about being alone," says the family source. "She is upset, but for a long time she has treated him like a friend, not a romantic partner." The family source adds that some close to the singer, who had a breakdown in 2008, "are concerned about her future."

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Will Obama's order lead to surge in gun research?


MILWAUKEE (AP) — Nearly as many Americans die from guns as from car crashes each year. We know plenty about the second problem and far less about the first. A scarcity of research on how to prevent gun violence has left policymakers shooting in the dark as they craft gun control measures without much evidence of what works.


That could change with President Barack Obama's order Wednesday to ease research restrictions pushed through long ago by the gun lobby. The White House declared that a 1996 law banning use of money to "advocate or promote gun control" should not keep the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other federal agencies from doing any work on the topic.


Obama can only do so much, though. Several experts say Congress will have to be on board before anything much changes, especially when it comes to spending money.


How severely have the restrictions affected the CDC?


Its website's A-to-Z list of health topics, which includes such obscure ones as Rift Valley fever, does not include guns or firearms. Searching the site for "guns" brings up dozens of reports on nail gun and BB gun injuries.


The restrictions have done damage "without a doubt" and the CDC has been "overly cautious" about interpreting them, said Daniel Webster, director of the Center for Gun Policy and Research at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.


"The law is so vague it puts a virtual freeze on gun violence research," said a statement from Michael Halpern of the Union of Concerned Scientists. "It's like censorship: When people don't know what's prohibited, they assume everything is prohibited."


Many have called for a public health approach to gun violence like the highway safety measures, product changes and driving laws that slashed deaths from car crashes decades ago even as the number of vehicles on the road rose.


"The answer wasn't taking away cars," said Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association.


However, while much is known about vehicles and victims in crashes, similar details are lacking about gun violence.


Some unknowns:


—How many people own firearms in various cities and what types.


—What states have the highest proportion of gun ownership.


—Whether gun ownership correlates with homicide rates in a city.


—How many guns used in homicides were bought legally.


—Where juveniles involved in gun fatalities got their weapons.


—What factors contribute to mass shootings like the Newtown, Conn., one that killed 26 people at a school.


"If an airplane crashed today with 20 children and 6 adults there would be a full-scale investigation of the causes and it would be linked to previous research," said Dr. Stephen Hargarten, director of the Injury Research Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin.


"There's no such system that's comparable to that" for gun violence, he said.


One reason is changes pushed by the National Rifle Association and its allies in 1996, a few years after a major study showed that people who lived in homes with firearms were more likely to be homicide or suicide victims. A rule tacked onto appropriations for the Department of Health and Human Services barred use of funds for "the advocacy or promotion of gun control."


Also, at the gun group's urging, U.S. Rep. Jay Dickey, a Republican from Arkansas, led an effort to remove $2.6 million from the CDC's injury prevention center, which had led most of the research on guns. The money was later restored but earmarked for brain injury research.


"What the NRA did was basically terrorize the research community and terrorize the CDC," said Dr. Mark Rosenberg, who headed the CDC's injury center at the time. "They went after the researchers, they went after institutions, they went after CDC in a very big way, and they went after me," he said. "They didn't want the data to be collected because they were threatened by what the data were showing."


Dickey, who is now retired, said Wednesday that his real concern was the researcher who led that gun ownership study, who Dickey described as being "in his own kingdom or fiefdom" and believing guns are bad.


He and Rosenberg said they have modified their views over time and now both agree that research is needed. They put out a joint statement Wednesday urging research that prevents firearm injuries while also protecting the rights "of legitimate gun owners."


"We ought to research the whole environment, both sides — what the benefits of having guns are and what are the benefits of not having guns," Dickey said. "We should study any part of this problem," including whether armed guards at schools would help, as the National Rifle Association has suggested.


Association officials did not respond to requests for comment. A statement Wednesday said the group "has led efforts to promote safety and responsible gun ownership" and that "attacking firearms" is not the answer. It said nothing about research.


The 1996 law "had a chilling effect. It basically brought the field of firearm-related research to a screeching halt," said Benjamin of the Public Health Association.


Webster said researchers like him had to "partition" themselves so whatever small money they received from the CDC was not used for anything that could be construed as gun policy. One example was a grant he received to evaluate a community-based program to reduce street gun violence in Baltimore, modeled after a successful program in Chicago called CeaseFire. He had to make sure the work included nothing that could be interpreted as gun control research, even though other privately funded research might.


Private funds from foundations have come nowhere near to filling the gap from lack of federal funding, Hargarten said. He and more than 100 other doctors and scientists recently sent Vice President Joe Biden a letter urging more research, saying the lack of it was compounding "the tragedy of gun violence."


Since 1973, the government has awarded 89 grants to study rabies, of which there were 65 cases; 212 grants for cholera, with 400 cases, yet only three grants for firearm injuries that topped 3 million, they wrote. The CDC spends just about $100,000 a year out of its multibillion-dollar budget on firearm-related research, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has said.


"It's so out of proportion to the burden, however you measure it," said Dr. Matthew Miller, associate professor of health policy at the Harvard School of Public Health. As a result, "we don't know really simple things," such as whether tighter gun rules in New York will curb gun trafficking "or is some other pipeline going to open up" in another state, he said.


What now?


CDC officials refused to discuss the topic on the record — a possible sign of how gun shy of the issue the agency has been even after the president's order.


Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in a statement that her agency is "committed to re-engaging gun violence research."


Others are more cautious. The Union of Concerned Scientists said the White House's view that the law does not ban gun research is helpful, but not enough to clarify the situation for scientists, and that congressional action is needed.


Dickey, the former congressman, agreed.


"Congress is supposed to do that. He's not supposed to do that," Dickey said of Obama's order. "The restrictions were placed there by Congress.


"What I was hoping for ... is 'let's do this together,'" Dickey said.


___


Online:


Violence prevention research: http://www.ucdmc.ucdavis.edu/vprp


CDC injury prevention: http://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/nvdrs/


___


Follow Marilynn Marchione's coverage at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP


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Housing, job-market data push S&P to five-year high

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stronger-than-expected data on housing starts and jobless claims lit a fire under stocks on Thursday, pushing the S&P 500 to a five-year high and its third day of gains.


Shares of chipmaker Intel rose in extended-hours trading after the company forecast better-than-expected first-quarter gross margins. Intel gained 1.85 percent after closing up 2.6 percent at $22.68. Semiconductor shares <.sox> rose 2 percent to the highest close in eight months.


A pair of economic reports lifted investors' sentiment. The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits fell to a five-year low last week and housing starts jumped last month to the highest since June 2008.


Strength in the housing and labor markets is key to sustained growth and higher corporate profits, helping to bring out buyers even on a day when earnings reports were mixed.


Gains were tempered by weakness in the financial sector, with Bank of America down 4.2 percent to $11.28 and Citigroup off 2.9 percent to $41.24 after their results.


The S&P 500 ended at its highest since December 2007 and now sits just 5.6 percent from its all-time closing high of 1,565.15.


"Having consolidated really for the last two weeks, the fact that we broke out, I think that that is sucking in quite a bit of money," said James Dailey, portfolio manager of TEAM Asset Strategy Fund in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.


The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was up 84.79 points, or 0.63 percent, at 13,596.02. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was up 8.31 points, or 0.56 percent, at 1,480.94. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was up 18.46 points, or 0.59 percent, at 3,136.00.


Better-than-expected earnings and revenue reported by online marketplace eBay late Wednesday helped the stock gain 2.7 percent to $54.33.


In the housing sector, PulteGroup Inc shares gained 4.9 percent to $20.29 and Toll Brothers Inc advanced 3.1 percent to $35.99. The PHLX housing sector index <.hgx> climbed 2.4 percent, reaching its highest close since August 2007.


Financials were the only S&P 500 sector to register a slight decline for the day.


Bank of America's fourth-quarter profit fell as it took more charges to clean up mortgage-related problems. Citigroup posted $2.32 billion of charges for layoffs and lawsuits.


Energy shares led gains on the Dow as U.S. crude oil prices jumped more than 1 percent. Shares of Exxon Mobil were up 0.8 percent at $90.20 while shares of Chevron were up 0.7 percent at $114.75.


S&P 500 earnings are expected to have risen 2.3 percent in the fourth quarter, Thomson Reuters data showed. Expectations for the quarter have fallen considerably since October when a 9.9 percent gain was estimated.


Volume was roughly 6.5 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and the NYSE MKT, compared with the 2012 average daily closing volume of about 6.45 billion.


Advancers outpaced decliners on the NYSE by about 22 to 7 and on the Nasdaq by about 2 to 1.


(Additional reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Kenneth Barry and Nick Zieminski)



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The Lede Blog: An Irish Hostage Is 'Safe and Free' in Algeria, But Britons Are Told to Brace for Bad News

An Arabic-langauge video report from Al Jazeera showing the gas facility in Algeria where dozens of workers were taken hostage by Islamist militants.

Following a military raid on a gas facility in Algeria, where a heavily armed group of Islamist militants took dozens of workers hostage, the Irish government confirmed on Thursday that a man from Belfast who had been part of the group taken captive was free. The fate of other hostages remained unclear.

Algeria’s communications minister, Mohand Saïd Oublaïd, said that many of the hostages had been freed, but some were killed in the rescue effort, along with “a large number of terrorists.” A news agency in neighboring Mauritania reported that a spokesman for the Islamists claimed that a number of hostages were killed in the Algerian government raid.

Ireland’s foreign minister, Eamon Gilmore, said at a news conference, “while naturally we are delighted that Stephen McFaul is free and safe, our thoughts are with his fellow workers and the other people who have not been so fortunate. Our thoughts are particularly with the citizens of other countries who have still not been accounted for.”

Video of Ireland’s foreign minister, Eamon Gilmore, speaking to reporters about an Irish citizen, Stephen McFaul, who was freed from the custody of kidnappers in Algeria on Thursday.

Mr. McFaul was physically unharmed and being held at a military base, the minister said. He declined to provide further details of the hostage’s ordeal, out of respect for the feelings of the families of the other hostages.

Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain confirmed in an interview posted online by Britain’s Channel 4 News that at least one British hostage had been killed and said, “we should be prepared for the possibility of further bad news, very difficult news, in this extremely difficult situation.”

A spokesman for the Norwegian oil firm Statoil, which jointly operates the gas facility with BP, told reporters: “We have received information a out two of our employees being physically hurt, not serious, but the situation is unclear and very difficult to follow.”

Agence France-Presse video of a statement by a Norwegian oil company official on the hostage crisis at a facility in Algeria.

In Belfast, Mr. McFaul’s family expressed joy and relief in interviews with Ulster Television and BBC News. “I feel over the moon. I’m just really excited. I just can’t wait for him to get home,” his young son told UTV, as he broke down in tears.

The Irish prime minister, Enda Kenny, said in a statement:

I am greatly relieved to hear that Stephen is safe and well. I believe he has already spoken to his family in Belfast and I wish him a safe return home to his loved ones. I would like to pay tribute to all those who have been involved in the effort to resolve this crisis and my thoughts are with the other oil-field workers and their families who have found themselves at the center of this traumatic situation.

In the interview with UTV, Mr. McFaul’s family said he had called his wife after reaching safety. “I was delighted, I could not get better news,” said his mother. “I feel sorry for the other hostages and their families,” said Mr. McFaul’s father.


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RIM says users line up to try new BlackBerry 10 platform






TORONTO (Reuters) – BlackBerry maker Research in Motion is helping customers prepare to switch to its soon-to-be-launched BlackBerry 10 smartphones that it hopes will help it reclaim market share from rivals such as Apple Inc.


RIM is betting that the new range of touch-screen and keyboard devices, set for a January 30 launch, will revive its fortunes.






The company was “very enthused by the engagement and response of our customer base” to a program aimed at persuading them to adopt the BlackBerry 10 devices, Bryan Lee, senior enterprise accounts director, told Reuters on Wednesday.


Indeed, whether it will be successful in clawing back market share will depend on the response from RIM’s top clients, like companies and government agencies, who have long valued the strong security features that BlackBerry devices offer.


Lee said more than 1,600 customers in North America had registered for its recently launched BlackBerry 10 Ready Program and more than a thousand were actively using the program, which offers customers access to services, information and tools to ease their transition to the BlackBerry 10 and the BlackBerry Enterprise Server 10.


RIM also said its BlackBerry Enterprise Server 10, which runs the new devices on corporate networks, was in beta testing with more than 130 major government agencies and corporations in North America.


SHARES RISE


Waterloo, Ontario-based RIM, a one-time pioneer in the now ultra-competitive smartphone industry, has bled market share to Apple’s iPhone and devices powered by Google’s market-leading Android operating system, even among enterprise clients who once used BlackBerry devices exclusively.


Early adoption of the long-awaited BlackBerry 10 devices by government and corporate clients will help breathe new life into the struggling company, whose shares are down 90 percent from an all-time high of more than $ 148 in 2008.


Still, shares of RIM, which fell as low as $ 6.22 in September, have more than doubled in value over the last four months as the BlackBerry 10 launch approaches.


Lee said clients that were beta testing the new BlackBerry Enterprise Server 10 included more than 60 Fortune 500 companies and top North American government agencies.


RIM promises that its new line of devices will be faster and smoother than existing BlackBerry phones and will boast a large catalog of apps, crucial to the success of any new line of smartphones.


Shares of RIM were up 3.8 percent at $ 15.03 in afternoon trading on the Nasdaq on Wednesday, after Visa approved the smartphone company’s method of handling secure mobile payments; the technology will potentially allow users to tap their smartphones on credit card readers and pay for purchases.


RIM’s Toronto-listed shares were up 3.9 percent at C$ 14.83.


(Editing by Janet Guttsman and Bernadette Baum)


Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News





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Harley Pasternak Blogs About the Benefits of Eating Avocados















01/16/2013 at 04:00 PM EST








Getty. Inset: Lou Rocco/ABC


Every morning I receive an email with the newest scientific studies published in the exercise and nutrition world. Once in a while, a study comes up that makes me excited enough that I have to blog about it. Below is one of these studies.

Researchers from UCLA's Center for Human Nutrition revealed some interesting new information on the health benefits of Hass avocados. The study was divided in to two groups – one ate hamburgers with fresh Hass avocado halves, and one ate them without the avocados. 

Results showed significant heart health advantages when the avocado and the burger were eaten together, rather than the plain burger.

The group that ate the burger with the avocado had lower levels of inflammation indicators (a key risk factor for heart disease), lower triglyceride levels (a type of fat in the bloodstream that can lead to the hardening and narrowing of your arteries) and superior arterial blood flow than those that ate the burger plain.

I've always been a huge fan of avocados. A true superfood, they're high in fiber, vitamin E, cancer-fighting carotenoids, and perhaps most importantly, they're an amazing source of heart healthy monounsaturated fats.  

Much like its healthy-fat containing cousins olives and almonds, avocados are calorically-dense, but they're also nutrient dense. Moderation is key, and you don't need much for your body to reap the benefits.  

I find avocados are a great way to add some "richness" to many of my recipes and make for a healthier alternative to butter (on toast) and cream (in soups).

Below is a delicious tortilla soup recipe my clients really enjoy.  You can also find some great guacamole and smoothie recipes online.

Tortilla Soup with Avocado

Ingredients
4 medium corn tortilla(s) 
½ tsp garlic powder
¼ tsp cayenne pepper
1 small yellow or white onion, finely chopped 
1 clove garlic, minced 
2 medium ripe tomatoes, finely chopped
1 medium yellow pepper, finely chopped
1 ripe avocado, pitted and sliced length-wise
1 medium serrano or jalapeno chile, seeded and minced
3 cups reduced-sodium chicken broth
2 Tbsp fresh cilantro, minced, divided 
Salt (to taste)
½ tsp black pepper 
¼ cup low-fat shredded cheese (optional)

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 400ºF.
2. Create a mixture of the garlic powder and cayenne pepper. Dust both sides of each tortilla with the mixture, then cut each into strips, about 1-inch wide. Place on cookie sheet; bake until just crisp, about 9 minutes. Remove from oven and set aside.
3. Coat a medium pot with a light coat of cooking spray, and add chopped vegetables and sauté until soft – about 5 minutes.
4. Add broth, half the cilantro and salt and pepper and cook about 8 minutes.
5. Ladle soup into 4 bowls. Top each with the cheese, toasted tortilla strips, sliced avocado, and remaining cilantro. Serve hot. Serves 4

How do you like to cook with avocados? Tweet me @harleypasternak – and let me know.

Check back every Wednesday for more insider tips from celebrity trainer Harley Pasternak on Hollywood's hottest bodies – and learn how to get one yourself! Plus: Follow Harley on Twitter at @harleypasternak

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ER visits tied to energy drinks double since 2007


SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The young man stumbled into the emergency room late one night after a house party, saying his heart wouldn't stop pounding and he could barely breathe after downing liquor mixed with energy drinks.


Emergency physician Steve Sun soon found the patient was so dehydrated he was going into kidney failure — one of many troubling cases Sun says he has treated in recent years tied to energy drink consumption.


Sun's changing caseload appears in line with a new government survey that suggests the number of people seeking emergency treatment after consuming energy drinks has doubled nationwide during the past four years, the same period in which the supercharged drink industry has surged in popularity in convenience stores, bars and on college campuses.


"Five years ago, perhaps I would see one or two cases every three months or so. Now we're consistently seeing about two cases per month," said Sun, assistant medical director of the emergency department at St. Mary's Medical Center, on the edge of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park.


From 2007 to 2011, the government estimates the number of emergency room visits involving the neon-labeled beverages shot up from about 10,000 to more than 20,000. Most of the cases involved teens or young adults, according to the survey of the nation's hospitals released late last week by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.


More than half of the patients considered in the survey told doctors they had consumed only energy drinks. In 2011, about 42 percent of the cases involved energy drinks in combination with alcohol or drugs, such as the stimulants Adderall or Ritalin.


The beverage industry says energy drinks are safe and there is no proof linking the products to adverse reactions.


The report doesn't specify which symptoms brought people to the emergency room, but it calls energy drink consumption a "rising public health problem" that can cause insomnia, nervousness, headache, fast heartbeat and seizures that are severe enough to require emergency care.


Several emergency physicians said they had seen a clear uptick in the number of patients suffering from irregular heartbeats, anxiety and heart attacks who said they had recently downed an energy drink.


"A lot of people don't realize the strength of these things. I had someone come in recently who had drunk three energy drinks in an hour, which is the equivalent of 15 cups of coffee," said Howard Mell, an emergency physician in the suburbs of Cleveland, who serves as a spokesman for the American College of Emergency Physicians. "Essentially he gave himself a stress test and thankfully he passed. But if he had a weak heart or suffered from coronary disease and didn't know it, this could have precipitated very bad things."


The findings came as concerns over energy drinks have intensified following reports last fall of 18 deaths possibly tied to the drinks and so-called energy shots — including a 14-year-old Maryland girl whose family filed a lawsuit after she drank two large cans of Monster Energy drinks and died. Monster says its products were not responsible for the death.


Two senators are calling for the Food and Drug Administration to investigate safety concerns about energy drinks and their ingredients.


Late last year, the FDA asked the U.S. Health and Human Services to update the figures its substance abuse research arm compiles about emergency room visits tied to energy drinks.


The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's survey was based on responses it receives from about 230 hospitals each year, a representative sample of about 5 percent of emergency departments nationwide. The agency then uses those responses to estimate the number of energy drink-related emergency department visits nationwide.


The more than 20,000 cases estimated for 2011 represent a small portion of the annual 136 million emergency room visits tracked by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.


The FDA said it was considering the findings and pressing for more details as it undertakes a broad review of the safety of energy drinks and related ingredients this spring.


"We will examine this additional information ... as a part of our ongoing investigation into potential safety issues surrounding the use of energy-drink products," FDA spokeswoman Shelly Burgess said in a statement.


Beverage manufacturers fired back at the survey, saying the statistics were misleading and taken out of context.


"This report does not share information about the overall health of those who may have consumed energy drinks, or what symptoms brought them to the ER in the first place," the American Beverage Association said in a statement. "There is no basis by which to understand the overall caffeine intake of any of these individuals — from all sources."


Energy drinks remain a small part of the carbonated soft drinks market, representing only 3.3 percent of sales volume, according to the industry tracker Beverage Digest. Even as soda consumption has flagged in recent years, energy drinks sales are growing rapidly.


In 2011, sales volume for energy drinks rose by almost 17 percent, with the top three companies — Monster, Red Bull and Rockstar — each logging double-digit gains, Beverage Digest found. The drinks are often marketed at sporting events that are popular among younger people such as surfing and skateboarding.


From 2007 to 2011, the most recent year for which data was available, people from 18 to 25 were the most common age group seeking emergency treatment for energy drink-related reactions, the report found.


"We were really concerned to find that in four years the number of emergency department visits almost doubled, and these drinks are largely marketed to younger people," said Al Woodward, a senior statistical analyst with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration who worked on the report.


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Follow Garance Burke on Twitter at http://twitter.com/garanceburke


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S&P 500 ends flat as bank profits temper growth concerns

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The S&P 500 ended nearly flat on Wednesday as solid earnings from two major banks and a bounceback in Apple shares offset concerns about a lower forecast for global growth in 2013.


Shares of Goldman Sachs hit their highest since May 2011 as earnings nearly tripled on increased revenue from dealmaking and lower compensation expenses. JPMorgan Chase said fourth-quarter net income jumped 53 percent and earnings for 2012 set a record.


JPMorgan shares rose 1 percent to $46.82, while Goldman climbed 4.1 percent to $141.09.


They were among the first big banks to report results and helped to lift estimates for S&P 500 corporate earnings slightly, to a 2.2 percent gain, Thomson Reuters data showed.


"Pretty solid numbers from both JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs are putting a lot of momentum behind the financials, with a lot more names to report this week. But I think that's helping to put a better bid to the market overall," said Michael James, senior trader at Wedbush Morgan in Los Angeles.


Apple rebounded after three days of losses, helping the Nasdaq outperform the S&P 500 and Dow. Apple rose 4.2 percent to $506.09. It closed below $500 on Tuesday for the first time since February.


"There could not have been more negativity around Apple going into today. So was it due for an oversold bounce on a trading basis? Absolutely," James said.


A slow economic recovery in developed nations is holding back the global economy, the World Bank said on Tuesday, as it sharply scaled back its forecast for world growth in 2013 to 2.4 percent from an earlier forecast of 3.0 percent.


The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was down 23.66 points, or 0.17 percent, at 13,511.23. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was up 0.29 points, or 0.02 percent, at 1,472.63. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was up 6.77 points, or 0.22 percent, at 3,117.54.


The biggest drag on the Dow was Boeing , whose shares fell 3.4 percent to $74.34 on concerns about its new Dreamliner passenger jets. Japan's two leading airlines grounded their fleets of 787s after an emergency landing, adding to safety concerns triggered by a series of recent incidents.


After the bell, shares of eBay were trading up 0.7 at $53.28, reversing an initial decline following the release of its results. Also after the close, shares of CBS rose 8.3 percent to $41.10 after it said it will convert its Outdoor Americas division into a real estate investment trust. [ID:nL4N0AL98X]


Earlier in the day, U.S. economic data showed consumer prices were flat in December, pointing to muted inflation pressures that should give the Federal Reserve room to prop up the economy by staying on its ultra-easy monetary policy path.


Other data showed U.S. homebuilder confidence in the market for single family homes held steady near seven year highs in January, suggesting the outlook for the housing market remained upbeat.


Volume was roughly 5.6 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and the NYSE MKT, compared with the 2012 average daily closing volume of about 6.45 billion.


Decliners outpaced advancers on the NYSE by nearly 8 to 7 and on the Nasdaq by almost 7 to 5.


(Additional reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Nick Zieminski and Kenneth Barry)



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