AMMAN (Reuters) - About 30 Lebanese Hezbollah fighters and 20 Syrian soldiers and militiamen loyal to President Bashar al-Assad have been killed in the fiercest fighting this year in the rebel stronghold of Qusair, Syrian activists said on Monday.
If confirmed, the Hezbollah toll from Sunday's battles in Qusair near the Lebanese border would highlight a deepening intervention in Syria by the guerrilla group set up by Iran in the 1980s to fight Israeli occupation troops in south Lebanon.
The reported Hezbollah losses also reflect the extent to which the Syrian conflict is turning into a proxy war between Shi'ite Iran and U.S.-aligned Gulf Arab states such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar, which back Assad's mostly Sunni foes.
Western countries and Russia, an ally of Damascus, back opposing sides in this regional free-for-all which is also sucking in Israel. Three times this year Israeli planes have bombed presumed Iranian arms stocks destined for Hezbollah.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his country was "preparing for every scenario" in Syria and held out the prospect of more Israeli strikes inside Syria to stop Hezbollah and other opponents of Israel getting advanced weapons.
Israel has not confirmed or denied reports by Western and Israeli intelligence sources that its raids targeted Iranian missiles stored near Damascus that it believed were awaiting delivery to Hezbollah, which fought a war with Israel in 2006.
FOG OF WAR
Syrian opposition sources and state media gave widely differing accounts of Sunday's ferocious clashes in Qusair, long used by rebels as a supply route from the nearby Lebanese border to the provincial capital Homs. Hezbollah has not commented.
The air and tank assault on the strategic town of 30,000 people appeared to be part of a campaign by Assad's forces to consolidate their grip on Damascus and secure links between the capital and government strongholds in the Alawite coastal heartland via the contested central city of Homs.
The government campaign has coincided with efforts by the United States and Russia, despite their differences on Syria, to organize peace talks to end a conflict now in its third year in which more than 80,000 people have been killed.
A total of 100 combatants from both sides were killed in Sunday's offensive, according to opposition sources, including the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Troops have already retaken several villages around Qusair and have attacked increasingly isolated rebel units in Homs.
"If Qusair falls, God forbid, the opposition in Homs city will be in grave danger," said an activist who called himself Abu Jaafar al-Mugharbil.
State news agency SANA said the army had "restored security and stability to most Qusair neighborhoods" and was "chasing the remnants of the terrorists in the northern district".
However, opposition activists said rebels in Qusair, about 10 km (six miles) from the Lebanese border, had pushed back most of the attacking forces to their original positions in the east of the town and to the south on Sunday, destroying at least four Syrian army tanks and five light Hezbollah vehicles.
The Western-backed leadership of the Free Syrian Army, the loose umbrella group trying to oversee hundreds of disparate rebel brigades, said the Qusair fighters had thwarted Hezbollah with military operations it dubbed "Walls of Death".
Syrian government restrictions on access for independent media make it hard to verify such videos and accounts.
"NO DIALOGUE WITH TERRORISTS"
The fighting raged as Western nations seek to step up pressure on Assad - Britain and France want the European Union to allow arms deliveries to rebels - while preparing for the peace talks brokered by Russia and the United States next month.
Assad has scorned the idea that the conference expected to convene in Geneva could end a war that is fuelling instability and deepening Sunni-Shi'ite rifts across the Middle East.
"They think a political conference will halt terrorists in the country. That is unrealistic," he told the Argentine newspaper Clarin, in reference to Syria's mainly Sunni rebels.
Assad ruled out "dialogue with terrorists", but it was not clear from his remarks whether he would agree to send delegates to a conference that may falter before it starts due to disagreements between its two main sponsors and their allies.
The fractured Syrian opposition is to discuss the proposed peace conference at a meeting due to start in Istanbul on Thursday, during which it will also appoint a new leadership.
Attacks by troops and militias loyal to Assad, who inherited power in Syria from his father in 2000, have put rebels under pressure in several of their strongholds in recent weeks.
Assad, from Syria's minority Alawite sect, has been battling an uprising which began with peaceful protests in March 2011. His violent response eventually prompted rebels to take up arms.
Hezbollah has supported Assad throughout the crisis but for months denied reports it was fighting alongside Assad's troops.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights put the Hezbollah casualties on Sunday at 23 dead and more than 70 wounded, while 48 rebel fighters and four civilians were also killed.
Tareq Murei, an activist in Qusair, said six more people were killed on Monday as Syrian army artillery and Hezbollah rocket launchers bombarded rebel-held parts of the town.
Video footage purportedly showed a Syrian tank on fire at a street corner in the town. In another video a warplane was shown flying over the town amid the sound of explosions.
Lebanese security sources said at least 12 Hezbollah fighters were killed in Qusair on Sunday. Seven were to be buried in the Lebanese town of Baalbek and nearby villages on Monday.
(Writing by Dominic Evans,; Editing by Samia Nakhoul and Alistair Lyon)
Soft matter offers new ways to study how ordered materials arrange themselvesPublic release date: 20-May-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: John Toon jtoon@gatech.edu 404-894-6986 Georgia Institute of Technology
A fried breakfast food popular in Spain provided the inspiration for the development of doughnut-shaped droplets that may provide scientists with a new approach for studying fundamental issues in physics, mathematics and materials.
The doughnut-shaped droplets, a shape known as toroidal, are formed from two dissimilar liquids using a simple rotating stage and an injection needle. About a millimeter in overall size, the droplets are produced individually, their shapes maintained by a surrounding springy material made of polymers. Droplets in this toroidal shape made of a liquid crystal the same type of material used in laptop displays may have properties very different from those of spherical droplets made from the same material.
While researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology don't have a specific application for the doughnut-shaped droplets yet, they believe the novel structures offer opportunities to study many interesting problems, from looking at the properties of ordered materials within these confined spaces to studying how geometry affects how cells behave.
"Our experiments provide a fresh approach to the way that people have been looking at these kinds of problems, which is mainly theoretical. We are doing experiments with toroids whose geometry can be precisely controlled in the lab," said Alberto Fernandez-Nieves, an assistant professor in the Georgia Tech School of Physics. "This work opens up a new way to experimentally look at problems that nobody has been able to study before. The properties of toroidal surfaces are very different, from a general point of view, from those of spherical surfaces."
Development of these "stable nematic droplets with handles" was described May 20 in the early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The research has been sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF), and also involves researchers at the Lorentz Institute for Theoretical Physics at Leiden University in The Netherlands and at York University in the United Kingdom.
Droplets normally form spherical shapes to minimize the surface area required to contain a given volume of liquid. Though they appear to be simple, when an ordered material like a crystal or a liquid crystal lives on the surface of a sphere, it provides interesting challenges to mathematicians and theoretical physicists.
A physicist who focuses on soft condensed matter, Fernandez-Nieves had long been interested in the theoretical aspects of curved surfaces. Working with graduate research assistant Ekapop Pairam and postdoctoral fellow Jayalakshmi Vallamkondu, he wanted to extend the theoretical studies into the experimental world for a system of toroidal shapes.
But could doughnut-shaped droplets be made in the lab?
The partial answer came from churros Fernandez-Nieves ate as a child growing up in Spain. These "Spanish doughnuts" actually spirals are made by injecting dough into hot oil while the dough is spun and fried.
In the lab at a much smaller size scale, the researchers found they could use a similar process with two immiscible liquids such as glycerine or water and oil, a needle and a magnetically-controlled rotating stage. A droplet of glycerine is injected into the rotating stage containing the oil. In certain conditions, a jet forms at the needle, which closes up into a torus because of the imposed rotation.
"You can control the two relevant curvatures of the torus," explained Fernandez-Nieves. "You can control how large it is because you can move the needle with respect to the rotation axis. You can also infuse more volume to make the torus thicker."
If the stage is then turned off, however, the drop of glycerine quickly loses its doughnut shape as surface tension forces it to become a traditional spherical droplet. To maintain the toroidal shape, Fernandez-Nieves and his collaborators replace the surrounding oil with a springy polymeric material; the springy character of this material provides a force that can overcome surface tension forces.
"When you are making the toroid, the forces on the needle are large enough that the surrounding material behaves as a fluid," he explained. "Once you stop, the elasticity of the outside fluid overcomes surface tension and that freezes the structure in place."
The researchers have been using the doughnut shapes to study how liquid crystal materials, which are well known for their applications in laptop displays, organize inside the torus. These materials have degrees of order beyond those of simple liquids such as water. For these materials, the toroidal shape provides a new set of study opportunities from both theoretical and experimental perspectives.
"This changes how you think about a liquid inside a container," said Fernandez-Nieves. "The materials will still adopt the shape of the container, but its energy will be different depending on the shape. The materials feel distortions and will try to minimize them. In a given shape, the molecules in these materials will rearrange themselves to minimize these distortions."
Among the surprises is that the nematic droplets created with toroidal shapes become chiral, that is, they adopt a certain twisting direction and break their mirror symmetry.
"In our case, the materials we are using are not chiral under normal circumstances," he noted. "This was a surprise to us, and it has to do with how we are confining the molecules."
Beyond looking at the dynamics of creating the droplets and how ordered materials behave when the torus transforms into a sphere, Fernandez-Nieves and colleagues are also exploring potential biological applications, applying electrical fields to the droplets, and sharing the unique structures with scientists at other institutions.
"This is the first time that stable nematic droplets have been generated with handles, and we have exploited that to look at the nematic organization inside those spaces," said Fernandez-Nieves. "Our experiments open up a versatile new approach for generating handled droplets made of an ordered material that can self-assemble into interesting and unexpected structures when confined to these non-spherical spaces. Now that theoreticians realize we can generate and study these systems, there may be much more development in this area."
###
In addition to those already mentioned, the paper's authors included V. Koning, B.C. van Zuiden and V. Vitelli from Leiden University, M.A. Bates from the University of York in the United Kingdom, and P.W. Ellis from Georgia Tech.
The research described here has been sponsored by the National Science Foundation under CAREER award DMR-0847304. The findings and conclusions are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the National Science Foundation.
CITATION: E. Pairam, et al., "Stable nematic droplets with handles," (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2013)
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Soft matter offers new ways to study how ordered materials arrange themselvesPublic release date: 20-May-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: John Toon jtoon@gatech.edu 404-894-6986 Georgia Institute of Technology
A fried breakfast food popular in Spain provided the inspiration for the development of doughnut-shaped droplets that may provide scientists with a new approach for studying fundamental issues in physics, mathematics and materials.
The doughnut-shaped droplets, a shape known as toroidal, are formed from two dissimilar liquids using a simple rotating stage and an injection needle. About a millimeter in overall size, the droplets are produced individually, their shapes maintained by a surrounding springy material made of polymers. Droplets in this toroidal shape made of a liquid crystal the same type of material used in laptop displays may have properties very different from those of spherical droplets made from the same material.
While researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology don't have a specific application for the doughnut-shaped droplets yet, they believe the novel structures offer opportunities to study many interesting problems, from looking at the properties of ordered materials within these confined spaces to studying how geometry affects how cells behave.
"Our experiments provide a fresh approach to the way that people have been looking at these kinds of problems, which is mainly theoretical. We are doing experiments with toroids whose geometry can be precisely controlled in the lab," said Alberto Fernandez-Nieves, an assistant professor in the Georgia Tech School of Physics. "This work opens up a new way to experimentally look at problems that nobody has been able to study before. The properties of toroidal surfaces are very different, from a general point of view, from those of spherical surfaces."
Development of these "stable nematic droplets with handles" was described May 20 in the early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The research has been sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF), and also involves researchers at the Lorentz Institute for Theoretical Physics at Leiden University in The Netherlands and at York University in the United Kingdom.
Droplets normally form spherical shapes to minimize the surface area required to contain a given volume of liquid. Though they appear to be simple, when an ordered material like a crystal or a liquid crystal lives on the surface of a sphere, it provides interesting challenges to mathematicians and theoretical physicists.
A physicist who focuses on soft condensed matter, Fernandez-Nieves had long been interested in the theoretical aspects of curved surfaces. Working with graduate research assistant Ekapop Pairam and postdoctoral fellow Jayalakshmi Vallamkondu, he wanted to extend the theoretical studies into the experimental world for a system of toroidal shapes.
But could doughnut-shaped droplets be made in the lab?
The partial answer came from churros Fernandez-Nieves ate as a child growing up in Spain. These "Spanish doughnuts" actually spirals are made by injecting dough into hot oil while the dough is spun and fried.
In the lab at a much smaller size scale, the researchers found they could use a similar process with two immiscible liquids such as glycerine or water and oil, a needle and a magnetically-controlled rotating stage. A droplet of glycerine is injected into the rotating stage containing the oil. In certain conditions, a jet forms at the needle, which closes up into a torus because of the imposed rotation.
"You can control the two relevant curvatures of the torus," explained Fernandez-Nieves. "You can control how large it is because you can move the needle with respect to the rotation axis. You can also infuse more volume to make the torus thicker."
If the stage is then turned off, however, the drop of glycerine quickly loses its doughnut shape as surface tension forces it to become a traditional spherical droplet. To maintain the toroidal shape, Fernandez-Nieves and his collaborators replace the surrounding oil with a springy polymeric material; the springy character of this material provides a force that can overcome surface tension forces.
"When you are making the toroid, the forces on the needle are large enough that the surrounding material behaves as a fluid," he explained. "Once you stop, the elasticity of the outside fluid overcomes surface tension and that freezes the structure in place."
The researchers have been using the doughnut shapes to study how liquid crystal materials, which are well known for their applications in laptop displays, organize inside the torus. These materials have degrees of order beyond those of simple liquids such as water. For these materials, the toroidal shape provides a new set of study opportunities from both theoretical and experimental perspectives.
"This changes how you think about a liquid inside a container," said Fernandez-Nieves. "The materials will still adopt the shape of the container, but its energy will be different depending on the shape. The materials feel distortions and will try to minimize them. In a given shape, the molecules in these materials will rearrange themselves to minimize these distortions."
Among the surprises is that the nematic droplets created with toroidal shapes become chiral, that is, they adopt a certain twisting direction and break their mirror symmetry.
"In our case, the materials we are using are not chiral under normal circumstances," he noted. "This was a surprise to us, and it has to do with how we are confining the molecules."
Beyond looking at the dynamics of creating the droplets and how ordered materials behave when the torus transforms into a sphere, Fernandez-Nieves and colleagues are also exploring potential biological applications, applying electrical fields to the droplets, and sharing the unique structures with scientists at other institutions.
"This is the first time that stable nematic droplets have been generated with handles, and we have exploited that to look at the nematic organization inside those spaces," said Fernandez-Nieves. "Our experiments open up a versatile new approach for generating handled droplets made of an ordered material that can self-assemble into interesting and unexpected structures when confined to these non-spherical spaces. Now that theoreticians realize we can generate and study these systems, there may be much more development in this area."
###
In addition to those already mentioned, the paper's authors included V. Koning, B.C. van Zuiden and V. Vitelli from Leiden University, M.A. Bates from the University of York in the United Kingdom, and P.W. Ellis from Georgia Tech.
The research described here has been sponsored by the National Science Foundation under CAREER award DMR-0847304. The findings and conclusions are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the National Science Foundation.
CITATION: E. Pairam, et al., "Stable nematic droplets with handles," (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2013)
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) -- About 30 Saudi women teachers have demonstrated outside the kingdom's Education Ministry, demanding full time jobs.
An Associated Press reporter saw women holding posters Monday calling for full time contracts and benefits that include steady pay and retirement packages.
Some say they have been teaching part time in government schools for more than 10 years. The teachers have demonstrated in the past outside the ministry to press their demands.
Saudi Arabia is struggling to employ some of its best educated women. The Saudi statistics agency says women represent just 15 percent of the country's workforce.
The Labor Ministry says there are more than 200,000 unemployed women seeking jobs in the kingdom, and around 75 percent of them are college graduates.
New research indicates that women's reproductive function may be tied to their immune status. Previous studies have found this association in human males, but not females.
The study appears in the American Journal of Human Biology.
An animal's energetic resources must be carefully allocated, said University of Illinois anthropology professor Kathryn Clancy, who led the new research. The body's first priority is maintenance, which includes tasks inherently related to survival, including immune function, she said. Any leftover energy is then dedicated to reproduction. There is a balance between resource allocation to maintenance and reproductive efforts, and environmental stressors can lessen available resources, said Clancy, who co-directs the Laboratory for Evolutionary Endocrinology at Illinois.
The study participants were a group of healthy, premenopausal, rural Polish women who participate in traditional farming practices. The researchers collected the women's urine and saliva samples during the harvest season, when physical activity levels are at their peak. This physical work constrains available energetic resources. In previous studies, the highest levels of ovarian suppression occurred during the harvest season.
Researchers measured participants' salivary ovarian hormone levels daily over one menstrual cycle. They also tested urine samples for levels of C-reactive protein (CRP), a commonly used marker of inflammation.
"Depending on the other factors that you look at alongside it, CRP can tell you about immune function or it can tell you about psychosocial stress, because CRP has been correlated to both of those things in other populations," Clancy said.
The researchers observed a negative relationship between CRP and progesterone in the Polish women ? in women with high CRP, progesterone was low. Further, the researchers found that estradiol and the age of first menstruation were the strongest predictors of CRP levels.
Clancy noted that it is too early to tell whether these correlational relationships indicate a causal relationship in which inflammation suppresses ovarian hormones. However, she believes that there are two possible pathways that explain these results.
"One is that there is an internal mechanism, and this local inflammation drives higher levels of CRP, and that is what's correlating with the lower progesterone," she said. "The other possibility is that there is an external stressor like psychosocial or immune stress driving allocation to maintenance effort, which in turn is suppressing ovarian hormones."
Clancy believes that her research will help women "understand their bodies better."
"From an anthropological perspective, these trade-offs are really important because they help us understand the timing of different life events: Why does someone hit puberty when they do, why do they begin reproducing when they do, why do they space babies the way they do?" Clancy said.
"It's really interesting to see the interplay between a person's intentions about when and why to have children, and then their own body's allocations to reproduction or not," Clancy said.
###
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign: http://www.uiuc.edu
Thanks to University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for this article.
This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.
If Buccaneers coach Greg Schiano ever gets tired of having to tell people Josh Freeman is his starting quarterback, someone should probably mention to him that it?s kind of his own fault.
Schiano started singing like Tammy Wynette again in relation to Freeman Monday, the day after he was quoted as saying he was ?not against? the notion of starting rookie Mike Glennon instead.
?We have a starting quarterback, and it?s Josh Freeman,? Schiano said, via Stephen Holder of the Tampa Bay Times.
According to the report, Schiano said he?s trying to be honest, and doesn?t mean to put pressure on Freeman by saying such things in the national media.
?I guess nationally, they don?t sit here with me every day like you guys [local media] do,? Schiano said. ?From the day we arrived, our whole program has [been based on] competition, . . . That?s what we believe in. It?s the most competitive sports league in the world. It?s competition, and I love it.
?But we have our starting quarterback, and it?s Josh Freeman. I?m not looking to find another.?
If he really wanted to clear things up, he could always, you know, stop leaving the door open a crack every time he talks about Glennon.
Or, if he wanted a stronger statement on Freeman and how much he loves him under center, he could give him a new contract to replace the final year of his rookie deal.
But it doesn?t appear at the moment that Schiano intends to do either.
And that?s fine, as long as everyone?s clear about the implication sent by those actions.
He likes Freeman, right up until the point he decides he doesn?t.
So Schiano?s apparently going to have to keep clarifying all the things that he keeps saying, whether to the national or local media.
Exposure to traffic pollution increases asthma severity in pregnant womenPublic release date: 20-May-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Nathaniel Dunford ndunford@thoracic.org American Thoracic Society
ATS 2013, PHILADELPHIA ? Air pollutants from traffic are associated with increased asthma severity levels in pregnant asthmatic women, according to a new study.
"Air pollution is a known trigger for asthma symptoms," said lead author Janneane Gent, PhD, Research Scientist in Epidemiology (Environmental Health) at the Yale School of Public Health. "In our study, exposures were assessed using a sophisticated air pollution modeling system (Community Multiscale Air Quality, CMAQ) that permits community-level estimates (i.e., close to where the subject resides) instead of assigning regional measurements made at Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) central site monitors to all subjects. Using community-level estimates, we found that exposure to nitrogen dioxide at levels much lower than the current EPA standard was associated with increased risk of asthma morbidity."
The results of the study will be presented at the ATS 2013 International Conference.
The study enrolled 637 pregnant women (
Exposure to nitrogen dioxide, fine particulate matter, and the elemental carbon content of fine particulate matter were estimated using the CMAQ modeling system. Analyses of the relationship between exposure to traffic-related pollutants and asthma severity were adjusted for a number of possible confounding factors, including month of pregnancy, pre-pregnancy body mass index, demographics, health, household exposures and season.
Mean community-level predicted concentrations for nitrogen dioxide, elemental carbon and fine particulate matter were 23.7 parts per billion (ppb), 0.67 micrograms (one-millionth of a gram) per cubic meter of air (g/m3) and 11.1 g/m3, respectively.
Each 10 ppb increase in community-level nitrogen dioxide was associated with an increased risk of wheeze, with an odds ratio (the odds that an outcome will occur after a particular exposure, compared to the odds of the outcome occurring in the absence of that exposure) of 1.27. Each 10 ppb increase in nitrogen dioxide was also associated with a higher asthma severity score (odds ratio 1.31). Similarly, each 0.5 g/m3 increase in elemental carbon was associated with an increased risk of wheeze (odds ratio 1.30) and higher asthma severity score (odds ratio 1.32).
Exposure to fine particulate matter did not significantly increase asthma morbidity or asthma severity score.
"Exposure to air pollution from traffic is known to have a number of deleterious effects on human health," said Dr. Gent. "Our study suggests that exposures to community-level concentrations of traffic-related pollutants are associated with increased asthma morbidity, and that these pollutant concentrations are likely to be lower than those measured at EPA central monitoring sites."
###
* Please note that numbers in this release may differ slightly from those in the abstract. Many of these investigations are ongoing; the release represents the most up-to-date data available at press time.
Abstract 38621
Asthma Severity During Pregnancy: Effect Of Community-Level Exposure To Traffic-Related Pollutants
Type: Scientific Abstract
Category: 01.08 - Asthma: Epidemiology (EOH)
Authors: J.F. Gent1, J.M. Kezik1, T.R. Holford1, M.E. Hill1, L. McKay1, K. Belanger1, M.B. Bracken1, K. Demerjian2, B.P. Leaderer1; 1Yale University School of Public Health - New Haven, CT/US, 2State University of New York - Albany, NY/US
Abstract Body
Rationale: In a study of pregnant, asthmatic women (n=637) living in Connecticut and Western Massachusetts, we assessed the association between symptoms and medication use and community-level exposures to nitrogen dioxide (1-hr maximum NO2), fine particles (24-hr mean PM2.5), and elemental carbon content of PM2.5 (24-hr mean). Exposures were estimated using the high-resolution Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) model which predicts community-level values in 12x12 km grids. Methods: Women with active asthma (physician-diagnosed asthma plus symptoms and/or asthma medication use in the previous 12 months) were recruited before 24 weeks gestation. Subjects' home addresses were geocoded for assignment to pollution exposure grids. Symptoms and medication use for each 28-day gestational month were collected through phone interviews. Outcome measures included days of wheeze (categorized as 0, 1-7, > 7 but not daily, daily) and monthly 5-level asthma severity score (adapted from Global Initiative for Asthma guidelines). Effects of exposures (daily estimates averaged over gestational month) to NO2, elemental carbon and PM2.5 on asthma morbidity were examined with hierarchical, ordered logistic regression analyses using generalized linear mixed models adjusted for covariates related to pregnancy (month of pregnancy, pre-pregnancy body mass index); demographics and health (age, ethnicity, education level, allergies, [asthma medication use for models with wheeze]); household exposures (gas stove, reported mold or mildew, use of tobacco);and season. Results: Mean (standard deviation) community-level concentrations for NO2, elemental carbon and PM2.5, respectively were: 23.7 (8.6) ppb, 0.67 (0.25) g/m3 and 11.1(2.7) g/m3. In single pollutant models adjusted for covariates, each 10 ppb increase in community-level NO2 was associated with an increased risk of wheeze (odds ratio [OR] 1.27, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.10, 1.46) and higher asthma severity score (OR 1.31, 95% CI 1.16, 1.49). Each 0.5 g/m3 increase in elemental carbon was associated with an increased risk of wheeze (OR 1.30, 95% CI 1.06, 1.58) and higher asthma severity score (OR 1.32, 95% CI 1.10, 1.58). No significant effects on asthma morbidity were observed for exposure to PM2.5 (wheeze OR 1.09, 95% CI 0.95, 1.25; severity score OR 1.08, 95% CI 0.96, 1.21). Conclusion: Risk of increased asthma morbidity during pregnancy is significantly associated with exposure to ambient levels of traffic-related pollutants NO2 and the elemental carbon content of PM2.5. Health effects were associated with community-level estimates of NO2 at concentrations much lower than the EPA 1-hr maximum standard of 100 ppb. There currently is no EPA standard for elemental carbon.
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Exposure to traffic pollution increases asthma severity in pregnant womenPublic release date: 20-May-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Nathaniel Dunford ndunford@thoracic.org American Thoracic Society
ATS 2013, PHILADELPHIA ? Air pollutants from traffic are associated with increased asthma severity levels in pregnant asthmatic women, according to a new study.
"Air pollution is a known trigger for asthma symptoms," said lead author Janneane Gent, PhD, Research Scientist in Epidemiology (Environmental Health) at the Yale School of Public Health. "In our study, exposures were assessed using a sophisticated air pollution modeling system (Community Multiscale Air Quality, CMAQ) that permits community-level estimates (i.e., close to where the subject resides) instead of assigning regional measurements made at Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) central site monitors to all subjects. Using community-level estimates, we found that exposure to nitrogen dioxide at levels much lower than the current EPA standard was associated with increased risk of asthma morbidity."
The results of the study will be presented at the ATS 2013 International Conference.
The study enrolled 637 pregnant women (
Exposure to nitrogen dioxide, fine particulate matter, and the elemental carbon content of fine particulate matter were estimated using the CMAQ modeling system. Analyses of the relationship between exposure to traffic-related pollutants and asthma severity were adjusted for a number of possible confounding factors, including month of pregnancy, pre-pregnancy body mass index, demographics, health, household exposures and season.
Mean community-level predicted concentrations for nitrogen dioxide, elemental carbon and fine particulate matter were 23.7 parts per billion (ppb), 0.67 micrograms (one-millionth of a gram) per cubic meter of air (g/m3) and 11.1 g/m3, respectively.
Each 10 ppb increase in community-level nitrogen dioxide was associated with an increased risk of wheeze, with an odds ratio (the odds that an outcome will occur after a particular exposure, compared to the odds of the outcome occurring in the absence of that exposure) of 1.27. Each 10 ppb increase in nitrogen dioxide was also associated with a higher asthma severity score (odds ratio 1.31). Similarly, each 0.5 g/m3 increase in elemental carbon was associated with an increased risk of wheeze (odds ratio 1.30) and higher asthma severity score (odds ratio 1.32).
Exposure to fine particulate matter did not significantly increase asthma morbidity or asthma severity score.
"Exposure to air pollution from traffic is known to have a number of deleterious effects on human health," said Dr. Gent. "Our study suggests that exposures to community-level concentrations of traffic-related pollutants are associated with increased asthma morbidity, and that these pollutant concentrations are likely to be lower than those measured at EPA central monitoring sites."
###
* Please note that numbers in this release may differ slightly from those in the abstract. Many of these investigations are ongoing; the release represents the most up-to-date data available at press time.
Abstract 38621
Asthma Severity During Pregnancy: Effect Of Community-Level Exposure To Traffic-Related Pollutants
Type: Scientific Abstract
Category: 01.08 - Asthma: Epidemiology (EOH)
Authors: J.F. Gent1, J.M. Kezik1, T.R. Holford1, M.E. Hill1, L. McKay1, K. Belanger1, M.B. Bracken1, K. Demerjian2, B.P. Leaderer1; 1Yale University School of Public Health - New Haven, CT/US, 2State University of New York - Albany, NY/US
Abstract Body
Rationale: In a study of pregnant, asthmatic women (n=637) living in Connecticut and Western Massachusetts, we assessed the association between symptoms and medication use and community-level exposures to nitrogen dioxide (1-hr maximum NO2), fine particles (24-hr mean PM2.5), and elemental carbon content of PM2.5 (24-hr mean). Exposures were estimated using the high-resolution Community Multiscale Air Quality (CMAQ) model which predicts community-level values in 12x12 km grids. Methods: Women with active asthma (physician-diagnosed asthma plus symptoms and/or asthma medication use in the previous 12 months) were recruited before 24 weeks gestation. Subjects' home addresses were geocoded for assignment to pollution exposure grids. Symptoms and medication use for each 28-day gestational month were collected through phone interviews. Outcome measures included days of wheeze (categorized as 0, 1-7, > 7 but not daily, daily) and monthly 5-level asthma severity score (adapted from Global Initiative for Asthma guidelines). Effects of exposures (daily estimates averaged over gestational month) to NO2, elemental carbon and PM2.5 on asthma morbidity were examined with hierarchical, ordered logistic regression analyses using generalized linear mixed models adjusted for covariates related to pregnancy (month of pregnancy, pre-pregnancy body mass index); demographics and health (age, ethnicity, education level, allergies, [asthma medication use for models with wheeze]); household exposures (gas stove, reported mold or mildew, use of tobacco);and season. Results: Mean (standard deviation) community-level concentrations for NO2, elemental carbon and PM2.5, respectively were: 23.7 (8.6) ppb, 0.67 (0.25) g/m3 and 11.1(2.7) g/m3. In single pollutant models adjusted for covariates, each 10 ppb increase in community-level NO2 was associated with an increased risk of wheeze (odds ratio [OR] 1.27, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.10, 1.46) and higher asthma severity score (OR 1.31, 95% CI 1.16, 1.49). Each 0.5 g/m3 increase in elemental carbon was associated with an increased risk of wheeze (OR 1.30, 95% CI 1.06, 1.58) and higher asthma severity score (OR 1.32, 95% CI 1.10, 1.58). No significant effects on asthma morbidity were observed for exposure to PM2.5 (wheeze OR 1.09, 95% CI 0.95, 1.25; severity score OR 1.08, 95% CI 0.96, 1.21). Conclusion: Risk of increased asthma morbidity during pregnancy is significantly associated with exposure to ambient levels of traffic-related pollutants NO2 and the elemental carbon content of PM2.5. Health effects were associated with community-level estimates of NO2 at concentrations much lower than the EPA 1-hr maximum standard of 100 ppb. There currently is no EPA standard for elemental carbon.
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MINEOLA, N.Y. (AP) ? In what police are describing as a crime of opportunity, a wanted man with a criminal history dating nearly 15 years entered a front door that had been left open at a New York home near Hofstra University.
A short time later, the intruder, Dalton Smith, and a 21-year-old college junior, Andrea Rebello, were both dead. The two were killed early Friday by a Nassau County police officer who fired eight shots at the masked man, hitting him seven times but also accidentally hitting Rebello once in the head, Nassau County homicide squad Lt. John Azzata said Saturday.
Smith was holding Rebello in a headlock and pointing a gun at her head before he turned his gun at the officer, Azzata said, prompting the shooting.
"He kept saying, 'I'm going to kill her,' and then he pointed the gun at the police officer," Azzata said.
A loaded 9 mm handgun with a serial number scratched off was found at the scene, police said.
Nassau County Police Commissioner Thomas Dale said he had traveled to Rebello's Tarrytown, N.Y., home to explain to Rebello's parents what happened.
"I felt obligated as a police commissioner and as a parent to inform them as soon as all the forensic results were completed," Dale said.
The veteran police officer, who was not identified, has about 12 years of experience on the Nassau County police force and previously spent several years as a New York City police officer, Dale said.
The officer is currently out on sick leave. He will be the focus of an internal police investigation once the criminal investigation is completed, which is standard police procedure in any officer-involved shooting, the commissioner said.
The shooting came just days before the school's commencement ceremonies, which are scheduled for Sunday.
A university spokeswoman said students will be handed white ribbons to wear in memory of Rebello. The shooting, which took place just steps from campus, has cast a pall over the university community as it geared up for commencement.
Earlier Saturday, police announced that Smith, 30, had been wanted on a parole violation related to a first-degree robbery conviction. A warrant was issued for Smith on April 25 for absconding from parole, police said.
Smith had what police described as "an extensive criminal history," which included arrests for robbery in the first degree in 1999, promoting prison contraband in the second degree in 2000, robbery in the first degree in 2003, assault in the second degree in 2003 and robbery in the second degree in 2003.
Rebello was in the two-story home in Uniondale, N.Y., with her twin sister Jessica, a third woman and a man when Smith, wearing a ski mask, walked into the house through an open front door, Azzata said.
The door was left open after someone had moved a car that was blocking a driveway, Azzata said.
When Smith entered, he demanded valuables and was told they were upstairs, Azzata said.
Smith, apparently unsatisfied with the valuables upstairs, asked if any of the four had a bank account and could withdraw money, Azzata said. The intruder then allowed the unidentified woman to leave and collect money from an ATM, telling her she had only eight minutes to come back with cash before he killed one of her friends, Azzata said.
The woman left for the bank and called 911, according to Azzata.
Minutes later, two police officers arrived at the home and found Rebello's twin sister Jessica running out of the front door and the male guest hiding behind a couch on the first floor, Azzata said.
One of the officers entered the home and encountered Smith holding onto Rebello in a headlock, coming down the stairs, Azzata said. Smith pulled Rebello closer and started moving backward toward a rear door of the house, pointing the gun at her head before eventually threatening the officer, Azzata said.
The Rev. Osvaldo Franklin, who gave Rebello and her twin their first communions, on Saturday night told The Associated Press their mother, Nella, couldn't even speak to him earlier in the day.
"She was so devastated," said Franklin. "She's just crying. We have to pray for Andrea, to pray for Jessica because she needs help."
Franklin said a funeral is scheduled for Wednesday at Teresa of Avila Church in Sleepy Hollow, N.Y., and will be in Portuguese.
"The family's a very good family, they have very good values," he said. "They are a very good, very devoted family."
___
Associated Press writer Jake Pearson in New York contributed to this report.
Any changes or updates to the roleplay or realm of Dreamscape will be posted here for easy tracking. You may find changes such as plot updates, character sheet or rule revisions, or temporary hiatuses. Please, this thread is reserved for GM, Co-GM or an agent of either to post. Consider this a read only thread. Thank you for your cooperation.
May 18, 2013 ? Patients with treatment-resistant major depression saw dramatic improvement in their illness after treatment with ketamine, an anesthetic, according to the largest ketamine clinical trial to-date led by researchers from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. The antidepressant benefits of ketamine were seen within 24 hours, whereas traditional antidepressants can take days or weeks to demonstrate a reduction in depression.
The research will be discussed at the American Psychiatric Association meeting on May 20, 2013 at the Moscone Center in San Franscico.
Led by Dan Iosifescu, MD, Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Mount Sinai; Sanjay Mathew, MD, Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Baylor College of Medicine; and James Murrough, MD Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Mount Sinai, the research team evaluated 72 people with treatment-resistant depression -- meaning their depression has failed to respond to two or more medications -- who were administered a single intravenous infusion of ketamine for 40 minutes or an active placebo of midazolam, another type of anesthetic without antidepressant properties. Patients were interviewed after 24 hours and again after seven days. After 24 hours, the response rate was 63.8 percent in the ketamine group compared to 28 percent in the placebo group. The response to ketamine was durable after seven days, with a 45.7 percent response in the ketamine group versus 18.2 percent in the placebo group. Both drugs were well tolerated.
"Using midazolam as an active placebo allowed us to independently assess the antidepressant benefit of ketamine, excluding any anesthetic effects," said Dr. Murrough, who is first author on the new report. "Ketamine continues to show significant promise as a new treatment option for patients with severe and refractory forms of depression."
Major depression is caused by a breakdown in communication between nerve cells in the brain, a process that is controlled by chemicals called neurotransmitters. Traditional antidepressants such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) influence the activity of the neurotransmitters serotonin and noreprenephrine to reduce depression. In these medicines, response is often significantly delayed and up to 60 percent of people do not respond to treatment, according to the U.S Department of Health and Human Services. Ketamine works differently than traditional antidepressants in that it influences the activity of the glutamine neurotransmitter to help restore the dysfunctional communication between nerve cells in the depressed brain, and much more quickly than traditional antidepressants.
Future studies are needed to investigate the longer term safety and efficacy of a course of ketamine in refractory depression. Dr. Murrough recently published a preliminary report in the journal Biological Psychiatry on the safety and efficacy of ketamine given three times weekly for two weeks in patients with treatment-resistant depression.
"We found that ketamine was safe and well tolerated and that patients who demonstrated a rapid antidepressant effect after starting ketamine were able to maintain the response throughout the course of the study," Dr. Murrough said. "Larger placebo-controlled studies will be required to more fully determine the safety and efficacy profile of ketamine in depression."
The potential of ketamine was discovered by Dennis S. Charney, MD, Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Dean of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs of The Mount Sinai Medical Center, in collaboration with John H. Krystal, MD, Chair of the Department of Psychiatry at Yale University.
"Major depression is one of the most prevalent and costly illnesses in the world, and yet currently available treatments fall far short of alleviating this burden," said Dr. Charney. "There is an urgent need for new, fast-acting therapies, and ketamine shows important potential in filling that void."
MOSCOW (Reuters) - U.N.Secretary General Ban Ki-moon voiced concern on Sunday over North Korea's launch of short-range missiles, urging Pyonyang to refrain from further launches and return to stalled nuclear talks with world powers.
Ban, who spoke to Russian state news agency RIA Novosti during a visit to Moscow, called North Korea's launch of three short-range missiles from its east coast on Saturday a "provocative action".
"We are very worried over North Korea's provocative action," he told RIA in comments translated into Russian.
"I hope North Korea will refrain from further such actions," Ban said. "They must soon return to talks and lower tensions."
The U.N. chief also called on Russia to exert its influence to help steer North Korea back to nuclear talks.
Launches by the North of short-range missiles are not uncommon but, after warnings from the communist state of impending nuclear war, such actions raised concerns about regional security and prompted Western powers to urge restraint.
Tension on the Korean peninsula has subsided in the past month, having run high for several weeks after Pyongyang's third nuclear test in February.
(Reporting by Alissa de Carbonnel; Editing by Alison Williams)
With two members of the Sports Advisory Board campaigning for a spot on the Tualatin Hills Park & Recreation District's board of directors, the district is looking for people to step up.
The Sports Advisory Committee oversees? the operation of athletic fields, sports programs and sports venues within the park district.
Committee meetings are typically held at 1 p.m. the third Thursday of every month at the park district's Athletic Center in the Howard M. Terpenning Recreation Complex at Northwest 158th Avenue and Southwest Walker Road in Beaverton.
Members of the public are welcome to attend. Terms are usually two or three years.
How to Apply
Application forms are available here, and must be completed and returned to the following address:
Attn: Anne Bookless THPRD 15707 S.W. Walker Rd. Beaverton, OR 97006
For more information about the Sports Advisory Committee, call Julie Rocha, the park district's Athletic Center supervisor, at 503-629-6330.
The committee reviews park plans and looks for ways to improve existing parks, fields and activities. The committee has helped provide scoreboards and dugout covers at Sunset Park and the Howard M. Terpenning Complex.
The committee also contributed to the installation of beginner skate park and two play structures at the complex.
The Sports Advisory Committee oversees several committees, such as the Baseball/Softball Steering Committee, the All Sports Steering Committee and the Unified Fields Steering Committee.
Appointees will be approved by the park district Board of Directors.
HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) ? Officials in Gov. Dannel P. Malloy's office say the governor will meet with representatives from the National Transportation Safety Board and Connecticut's two U.S. senators at the site of a Metro-North Railroad crash that injured 70 people.
Sens. Richard Blumenthal and Chris Murphy and other Connecticut officials will also participate in the tour, scheduled for 9:30 a.m. EDT Saturday near Bridgeport. The delegation will update journalists with the latest details of the crash after surveying the area.
Three people remain in critical condition following the rush-hour crash Friday between two commuter trains that serve the northern suburbs of New York City.
DAMASCUS, Va. (AP) ? About 50 to 60 people were injured Saturday when a driver described by witnesses as an elderly man drove his car into a group of hikers marching in a parade in a small Virginia mountain town.
It happened around 2:10 p.m. during the Hikers Parade at the Trail Days festival, an annual celebration of the Appalachian Trail in Damascus, near the Tennessee state line about a half-hour drive east of Bristol.
Washington County director of emergency management Pokey Harris said no fatalities had been reported.
The injuries ranged from critical to superficial, he said. Three of the victims were flown by helicopters to regional hospitals. Another 12 to 15 were taken by ambulance. The rest were treated at the scene.
At a news conference, Damascus Police Chief Bill Nunley didn't release the driver's name or age but said he was participating in the parade. Multiple witnesses described him as an elderly man.
Nunley said the man's 1997 Cadillac was one of the last vehicles in the parade and the driver might have suffered an unspecified medical problem when his car accelerated to about 25 mph and struck the crowd on a two-lane bridge along the town's main road. The driver was among those taken to hospitals.
"It is under investigation and charges may be placed," Nunley said.
There were ambulances in the parade ahead of the hikers and paramedics on board immediately responded to the crash.
Nunley cited the "quick action" by police, firefighters, paramedics and hikers to tend to the victims, including a Damascus volunteer firefighter who dove into the car to turn off the ignition. The firefighter, whose name wasn't released, suffered minor injuries.
Nunley said about 1,000 people participated in the parade. Nunley said the driver was a hiker, too ? someone who had traversed the Appalachian Trail in the past.
What caused the car to drive into the crowd wasn't immediately known. A thud could be heard, people yelled stop, and at some point, the car finally stopped.
Witnesses said the car had a handicapped parking sticker and it went more than 100 feet before coming to a stop.
"He was hitting hikers," said Vickie Harmon, a witness from Damascus. "I saw hikers just go everywhere."
Damascus resident Amanda Puckett, who was watching the parade with her children, ran to the car, where she and others lifted the car off those pinned underneath.
"Everybody just threw our hands up on the car and we just lifted the car up," she said.
Keith Neumann, a hiker from South Carolina, said he was part of the group that scrambled around the car. They pushed the car backward to free a woman trapped underneath and lifted it off the ground to make sure no one else was trapped. Another person jumped inside to put it in park.
"There's no single heroes. We're talking about a group effort of everybody jumping in," he said.
Mayor Jack McCrady encouraged people to attend the festival on Sunday, its final day.
"In 27 years of this, we've never had anything of this magnitude, and is it our job to make sure it doesn't happen again," he said.
McCrady said a donation fund was being set up to assist the injured, some of whom don't have medical insurance.
"We want to make sure they don't suffer any greater loss than they already have," he said.
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) ? A lottery official says 1 winning ticket has been sold in Florida for a record Powerball jackpot of more than $590 million.
Terry Rich, a lottery official in Iowa, confirmed the ticket matching all six numbers was sold in Florida. Rich told The Associated Press by telephone that details were expected to be announced later by Florida lottery officials about the actual ticket sold.
Powerball.com said the winner sold in Florida means the current estimated jackpot resets at $40 million or $25.1 million cash value.
The numbers drawn Saturday were: 10, 13, 14, 22, 52 and Powerball 11.
With four of every five possible combinations of Powerball numbers in play, someone was almost certain to win the game's highest jackpot, though chances of winning remained astronomically low at 1 in 175.2 million.
Have you decided to purchase some real estate? Intending to purchase a new property? If this applies to you, dont panic, it is a lot simpler process now than previously. Home listings are readily available for all areas. It is easy to access the details you require without always having to go through an estate agent.
By far the quickest way to find a property for sale would be via the internet. For example, use a search engine to find prospective homes in the state or region you are researching. By entering a few simple keywords, homes for sale adverts is a good place to start, a wealth of information will be at your finger tips.
Advertisments from properties for sale all over the country will be available for your perusal. There will be literally hundreds of sites featuring homes from many different real estate agencies. The format of the classifieds and agency links may differ from site to site but do not let this confuse or deter you.
By modifying the keywords used in your initial search you can streamline the classifieds to those that are more relevant to you. This will help you find more property for sale in the correct price range and zip code. Some property sites have great features that can inform you of price reductions when they happen and when new properties in certain areas become available for sale. Contact details for real estate agents will be listed and they will be more than happy to offer some expert advice.
Consider all options available in your area. Set a price range and look at all the different living spaces in the local listings. A condominium may be more suitable for you than a mobile home. Classifieds may differ on the way they display the properties for sale in the same place so it is best sometimes to consult an estate agent. Before you do this complete your research so you can provide the agent with a selection of homes you are considering within your required area and more importantly within your budget. You never know, they may be able to point you in the direction of a property that may interest you.
Whatever property you decide is right for you, it is important that you think about your purchase carefuly. This desicion will affect the rest of your life so choose wisely. You should start hunting for the property of your dreams now but remember to invest your money in the right home for you. The right purchase can be immensely rewarding.
Many people think it is not easy to learn about vehicle insurance policies is just too hard. Actually, investigation and comprehending ensure it is much less complicated.
Each and every business has their own method of computing your danger levels and premium prices. There are actually the plan that may be most competitive and finest fitted to you by looking at into policies from several opponents.
Several says make you must have insurance in the event you individual an auto. You are responsible for understanding which kind of insurance policy coverage in your state. You will be breaking up legal requirements and face monetary implications should you drive uninsured.
Most says have laws and regulations that need insurance when you generate. You ought to be mindful of the polices regarding bare minimum insurance policies you are required to have. You might be breaking up what the law states for those who have no insurance and have into a crash.
Do not pay for the monthly obligations. Your car insurance provider could add three to five $ $ $ $ to the high quality. This sum offers the prospective to add to your expenses swiftly. It can also become a time-consuming process when considering your other monthly bills. The less obligations you might have, the better cash you help save.
This will blow up within your deal with if you need to make a sizeable claim, but so long as you reduce costs to protect anything at all insurance won?t, it can be an excellent way to reduce expenses. Your costs will go down the bigger deductible.
Buy and sell inside your sports car for something more moderate car. Sporting activities autos generally cost you plenty more to make sure than many more. Sports autos also cost more for your insurance, therefore, the insurance plan will cost a lot more.
Insurance coverage is the greatest protection towards any type of any sort of accident.
Don?t get your adolescent an automobile of his very own. Including these to your preexisting insurance plan is significantly more affordable. Some firms provide very good marks.
House damage liability coverage is really a factor to have in your car insurance coverage that you must get. This includes any damages that the vehicle leads to in an auto accident. You will find only a few states kept in America which do not expect you to have this like a compulsory product.
If you have a admission or accidents in your history, your insurance firm may possibly decrease your rates by taking and finish driving a car classes.
Spend some time to go over a list of special discounts completely, and evaluate regardless if you are qualified for preserve a little bit of dollars.You may well be shocked at ways to spend less on rates.
A great way to lessen your car insurance rates is to get a vehicle alarm, satellite system or even an immobilizer.Theft avoidance on the car is likely to make a huge role with your insurance policy coverage. Your coverage will probably be decrease for those who have a less hazardous automobile.
Think about the price of insurance costs as you may think about investing in a automobile. Keep in mind that safe cars with greater safety measures get lower rates.You need to element in this expense as an element of your financial allowance whenever you are purchasing a motor vehicle.
Remove some other individuals out of your insurance as soon as they stop driving a vehicle your car or truck. If you eliminate an additional person your rates will most likely decline, eliminating them could help you save extra cash on your month-to-month and yearly rates.
Transferring to another one town or state can reduced the cost of your insurance costs. Costs and insurance policies may differ broadly based on your region. You might get less costly monthly premiums if you choose to relocate someplace else.
small loan The lowest rate doesn?t necessarily indicate the sole thing which should get your focus when searching for your vehicle insurance policy.
The sum you pay being a insurance deductible may be the most significant factor in determining exactly how much you will certainly be. Remember you are liable for having to pay this volume just in case you do get within an accident. You should place some cash aside in the event that one thing occurs.
Even though some claims have different insurance policy regulations, the standard methods of insurance are similar.
It is essential to know the automobile insurance requirements of the state you reside in.Each state has different kinds of legal guidelines consequently, so understand these just before buying a coverage.
As soon as a vehicle driver within your household purchases their own insurance policy, easily take them away from your coverage to avoid paying added costs. As an illustration, if your child will get their own personal plan, decrease your high quality through that little one taken from your plan. The quantity of car owners in your house includes a substantial quantity should you get rid of an additional motorist who possessed crashes and seats.
Even though suggests have distinct requirements, fundamentals of insurance are usually the identical.
Tend not to quickly agree to a deal through your insurance firm to give you a warranty for pieces useful for restoring your auto until you have investigated it first. The vast majority of restoration shops provide warranties on his or her skillfullness, and the majority of real restoration retailers placed an assurance on his or her job. Don?t waste materials your cash on the guarantee that you just don?t need to have.
Do not let your insurance firm to provide a guarantee for parts useful for fixing your vehicle maintenance components. More often than not, and the majority of garages ensure their fix function, parts integrated. You do not would like to squander your hard earned money on something which is junk.
It is recommended to review your car insurance each year when it comes up for revival. Make the information and facts are existing. If you have another career, as a consequence of operate location or another modifications, in the event you push less to acquire there.
You must also be aware of what your vehicle?s thievery level. Even though your car is older, but a commonly robbed motor vehicle, you might want to take into account complete insurance.
As was documented above, it really is achievable to change your car insurance policy in such a way that can reduced its charge. You can transform a variety of things about your situation to reduce your costs. Teaching yourself is the key element in selecting the right insurance plan for you personally, at the very best rate feasible.
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Public release date: 20-May-2013
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