Retooling Pap test to spot more kinds of cancer

WASHINGTON (AP) — For years, doctors have lamented that there's no Pap test for deadly ovarian cancer. Wednesday, scientists reported encouraging signs that one day, there might be.

Researchers are trying to retool the Pap, a test for cervical cancer that millions of women get, so that it could spot early signs of other gynecologic cancers, too.

How? It turns out that cells can flake off of tumors in the ovaries or the lining of the uterus, and float down to rest in the cervix, where Pap tests are performed. These cells are too rare to recognize under the microscope. But researchers from Johns Hopkins University used some sophisticated DNA testing on the Pap samples to uncover the evidence — gene mutations that show cancer is present.

In a pilot study, they analyzed Pap smears from 46 women who already were diagnosed with either ovarian or endometrial cancer. The new technique found all the endometrial cancers and 41 percent of the ovarian tumors, the team reported Wednesday in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

This is very early-stage research, and women shouldn't expect any change in their routine Paps. It will take years of additional testing to prove if the so-called PapGene technique really could work as a screening tool, used to spot cancer in women who thought they were healthy.

"Now the hard work begins," said Hopkins oncologist Dr. Luis Diaz, whose team is collecting hundreds of additional Pap samples for more study and is exploring ways to enhance the detection of ovarian cancer.

But if it ultimately pans out, "the neat part about this is, the patient won't feel anything different," and the Pap wouldn't be performed differently, Diaz added. The extra work would come in a lab.

The gene-based technique marks a new approach toward cancer screening, and specialists are watching closely.

"This is very encouraging, and it shows great potential," said American Cancer Society genetics expert Michael Melner.

"We are a long way from being able to see any impact on our patients," cautioned Dr. Shannon Westin of the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. She reviewed the research in an accompanying editorial, and said the ovarian cancer detection would need improvement if the test is to work.

But she noted that ovarian cancer has poor survival rates because it's rarely caught early. "If this screening test could identify ovarian cancer at an early stage, there would be a profound impact on patient outcomes and mortality," Westin said.

More than 22,000 U.S. women are diagnosed with ovarian cancer each year, and more than 15,000 die. Symptoms such as pain and bloating seldom are obvious until the cancer is more advanced, and numerous attempts at screening tests have failed.

Endometrial cancer affects about 47,000 women a year, and kills about 8,000. There is no screening test for it either, but most women are diagnosed early because of postmenopausal bleeding.

The Hopkins research piggybacks on one of the most successful cancer screening tools, the Pap, and a newer technology used along with it. With a standard Pap, a little brush scrapes off cells from the cervix, which are stored in a vial to examine for signs of cervical cancer. Today, many women's Paps undergo an additional DNA-based test to see if they harbor the HPV virus, which can spur cervical cancer.

So the Hopkins team, funded largely by cancer advocacy groups, decided to look for DNA evidence of other gynecologic tumors. It developed a method to rapidly screen the Pap samples for those mutations using standard genetics equipment that Diaz said wouldn't add much to the cost of a Pap-plus-HPV test. He said the technique could detect both early-stage and more advanced tumors. Importantly, tests of Paps from 14 healthy women turned up no false alarms.

The endometrial cancers may have been easier to find because cells from those tumors don't have as far to travel as ovarian cancer cells, Diaz said. Researchers will study whether inserting the Pap brush deeper, testing during different times of the menstrual cycle, or other factors might improve detection of ovarian cancer.

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Arias Kissed New Beau Day After Killing Boyfriend

Jodi Arias drove to the home of her new romantic interest, kissed him, and laughed with his friends just 24 hours after she stabbed and shot her ex-boyfriend Travis Alexander to death, according to court testimony today.

Ryan Burns, whom Arias met in the spring of 2008, took the stand today at the start of the fourth day of testimony in the trial.

Arias, 32, is accused of murdering Alexander, 30, her one-time boyfriend whom she continued to sleep with occasionally. She claims he was abusive and she stabbed and shot him in self-defense. Alexander's body was riddled with 27 knife wounds including a slashed throat and a bullet wound to the head.

WATCH LIVE: Jodi Arias Murder Trial

Burns, who met Arias at a business conference, exchanged frequent long phone calls and online conversations with Arias before inviting her to come visit him in West Jordan, Utah, in June. Arias lived in California at the time.

Arias has confessed to driving to Alexander's home in Mesa, Ariz., where she killed him, and then to Burns' home in Utah. She arrived at Burns's home 24 hours after she was expected there, telling him that she got lost, drove the wrong way on a freeway for a few hours, fell asleep for awhile, and then got lost again, Burns testified today.

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Photos of Key Players and Evidence in the Jodi Arias Murder Trial

She never told him that she had confronted Alexander with a knife or gun and ended up killing him just hours before their date.

When she arrived, the pair quickly got physical, he testified.

"We went back to my house. We talked for awhile, and agreed that we were going to watch a movie. At some point we were talking and we kissed. Every time we started kissing it got a little more escalated. Our clothes never came off, but at some point she was kissing my neck, I was kissing hers, but our clothes never came off," he said.

Burns said that both he and Arias stopped kissing at the time, though they again became physically involved later in the evening when Arias climbed on top of Burns and began kissing him. Burns said that they stopped kissing because he did not want her to "regret the visit" because of her Mormon beliefs about sex.

He also told prosecutors upon questioning that Arias was physically strong.

"She's very fit," he said, describing their encounter when she climbed on top of him. "She's very strong. She has close to a six pack (of abs)."

Prosecutors likely asked about the strength of Arias because in testimony Tuesday Maricopa County medical examiner Kevin Horn said Alexander was stabbed so forcefully that the blade chipped his skull and his neck was cut all the way back to the spinal cord.

Burns, who is also a Mormon, said he noticed two bandages on Arias's hand when she arrived at his house, which she told him she got when a glass broke at her place of employment, Margaritaville.

During her visit, the pair also went to a business meeting and went out with Burns' friends where Burns described Arias as acting "shy" and a "little awkward."

"She was fine, she was laughing about simple little things like any other person. I never once felt like anything was wrong during the day. With a crowd she was a little awkward in social areas, but one on one she was very talkative and excitable," he said.

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Hong Kong leader survives impeachment bid

HONG KONG: Hong Kong pro-democracy lawmakers failed in an unprecedented bid on Wednesday to impeach the city's embattled Beijing-backed leader, after they accused him of breaking housing laws and urged him to quit.

The city's first impeachment motion, which accused Leung Chun-ying of lying, dereliction of duty and serious breaches of the law in a row stemming from illegal structures at his luxury home, was denied after eight hours of debate.

The 27 pro-democracy lawmakers who signed the joint motion -- which they said was a symbolic move -- voted in favour, while 37 voted against in the 70-seat legislature which is dominated by pro-Beijing members.

Wednesday's vote followed a protest on New Year's Day in which tens of thousands took to the streets to urge Leung to quit and to press for greater democracy, 15 years after the city returned to Chinese rule.

The former British colony maintains a semi-autonomous status, with its own legal and judicial system, but cannot choose its leader through the popular vote.

Leung took office in July after he was picked by a 1,200-strong election committee dominated by pro-Beijing elites, amid rising anger over what many perceive to be China's meddling in local affairs.

China has said the chief executive could be directly elected in 2017 at the earliest, with the legislature following by 2020.

Unauthorised structures are a politically sensitive issue in the space-starved city of seven million and demonstrators have used the scandal to press for universal suffrage in choosing Hong Kong's leader.

Leung secured the chief executive role after criticising his rival Henry Tang over illegal structures at Tang's home.

But he has since acknowledged and apologised for structures at his own home which were built without planning permission.

Maverick lawmaker "Long Hair" Leung Kwok-hung, wearing a T-shirt reading "We topple a tyrant", accused the new leader of lying about his own structures during campaigning when he presented the impeachment motion earlier on Wednesday.

"He has used dishonest ways to win the election," he said.

Chief Secretary Carrie Lam, second in command in Leung's administration, said the motion was unnecessary and urged lawmakers to work together on policy and livelihood issues.

But Democratic Party chairwoman Emily Lau said the motion was a symbolic gesture to show the deepening public mistrust toward Leung, claiming the leader had "cheated his way to power".

"This is the first time we have a motion in the legislature to impeach a cheating chief executive," she said.

If the motion had been passed, the city's highest court would have had to initiate an investigation. At least two-thirds of the legislature would need to endorse a guilty finding before Leung could be removed from office.

Earlier, rival protesters traded barbs outside the legislature and security personnel had to step in at one point when an angry pro-government supporter charged towards the rival group, TV footage showed.

Leung's popularity ratings have fallen since the controversy, with discontent over issues including sky-high property prices and anti-Beijing sentiment remaining high.

- AFP/xq

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U.S. does not rule out complete pullout from Afghanistan after 2014

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration does not rule out a complete withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan after 2014, the White House said on Tuesday, just days before President Barack Obama is due to meet Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

The comments by U.S. Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes were the first signal that, despite initial recommendations by the top military commander in Afghanistan to keep as many as 15,000 troops in the country, the final decision may be to remove everyone, as happened in Iraq in 2011.

Asked about consideration of a so-called zero-option once the NATO combat mission ends at the end of 2014, Rhodes said: "That would be an option that we would consider."

"Because again, the president does not view these negotiations as having a goal of keeping U.S. troops in Afghanistan," he added, saying the objective was to ensure the training and equipping of Afghan forces and combating al Qaeda.

Rhodes, lowering expectations of any breakthrough in the talks with Karzai at the White House on Friday, said it would be months before a final decision is made on troop levels.

In Iraq, Obama decided to pull out all U.S. forces after failing in negotiations with the Iraqi government to secure immunity for any U.S. troops who would remain behind.

The Obama administration is also insisting on immunity for any U.S. troops that remain in Afghanistan, and that unsettled question will figure in this week's talks between Obama and Karzai and their aides.

Jeffrey Dressler, an Afghanistan expert at the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War who favors keeping a larger presence in Afghanistan, questioned what battlefield conditions would allow for a complete U.S. pullout.

"I can't tell that they're doing that as a negotiating position ... or if it is a no-kidding option," Dressler said. "If you ask me, I don't see how zero troops is in the national security interest of the United States."

U.S. officials have said privately that the White House had asked for options to be developed for keeping between 3,000 and 9,000 troops in the country, a lower range than was put forward initially by General John Allen, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan.

Allen suggested keeping between 6,000 and 15,000 troops in Afghanistan.

(Reporting By Matt Spetalnick and Phil Stewart; Editing by Eric Beech)

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2G scam: JPC summons former auditor RP Singh

NEW DELHI: The joint parliamentary committee (JPC) looking into the 2G spectrum scam that met on Tuesday decided to call former auditor RP Singh, who had alleged that he was forced to sign the controversial report of the government auditor ( CAG) on the 2G issue, attorney general G E Vahanvati and telecom secretary R Chandrashekhar as witnesses before the panel.

While the next meeting of the JPC has been scheduled for January 22, the members have decided to hold a JPC meeting every Tuesday after the next meeting so that the JPC report could be submitted to Parliament in the budget session, which begins by end-February.

A decision on calling finance minister P Chidambaram to appear before a parliamentary panel is also expected to be taken this month. The JPC appears to have entered its final few laps with members deciding "unanimously" to complete examination of witnesses by February 12 after which the drafting of the report would begin. Tuesday's meeting saw no decision on calling Chidambaram before the panel being taken. "To call somebody we do not need longer time. It is only a question of sending a notice and their coming before the committee," chairman P C Chacko said, while replying to a volley of questions on whether Chidambaram will be called as a witness, after Tuesday's meeting got over.

"Some members had written to the committee to ask R P Singh to appear again in view of some recent statements he had made," Chacko said. Vahanvati has also been asked to appear before the panel on the same day.

Chacko appeared to downplay BJP's demand for calling Chidambaram before the committee. "You know all what had happened in the past. There were demands, there were walkouts, there were coming backs," he said, adding that BJP members Harin Pathak and Ravi Shankar Prasad were present at the meeting on Tuesday. BJP member Yashwant Sinha, who has been most vocal on calling Chidambaram, was not present at the Tuesday's meeting. Sinha is caught up with developments in his home state Jharkhand, where a political crisis has erupted with the JMM withdrawing support to the BJP-led Arjun Munda government.

Members of the Association of Unified Telecom Service Providers of India, which represents CDMA operators, appeared before the panel on Tuesday.

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Report: Death rates from cancer still inching down

WASHINGTON (AP) — Death rates from cancer are continuing to inch down, researchers reported Monday.

Now the question is how to hold onto those gains, and do even better, even as the population gets older and fatter, both risks for developing cancer.

"There has been clear progress," said Dr. Otis Brawley of the American Cancer Society, which compiled the annual cancer report with government and cancer advocacy groups.

But bad diets, lack of physical activity and obesity together wield "incredible forces against this decline in mortality," Brawley said. He warned that over the next decade, that trio could surpass tobacco as the leading cause of cancer in the U.S.

Overall, deaths from cancer began slowly dropping in the 1990s, and Monday's report shows the trend holding. Among men, cancer death rates dropped by 1.8 percent a year between 2000 and 2009, and by 1.4 percent a year among women. The drops are thanks mostly to gains against some of the leading types — lung, colorectal, breast and prostate cancers — because of treatment advances and better screening.

The news isn't all good. Deaths still are rising for certain cancer types including liver, pancreatic and, among men, melanoma, the most serious kind of skin cancer.

Preventing cancer is better than treating it, but when it comes to new cases of cancer, the picture is more complicated.

Cancer incidence is dropping slightly among men, by just over half a percent a year, said the report published by the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Prostate, lung and colorectal cancers all saw declines.

But for women, earlier drops have leveled off, the report found. That may be due in part to breast cancer. There were decreases in new breast cancer cases about a decade ago, as many women quit using hormone therapy after menopause. Since then, overall breast cancer incidence has plateaued, and rates have increased among black women.

Another problem area: Oral and anal cancers caused by HPV, the sexually transmitted human papillomavirus, are on the rise among both genders. HPV is better known for causing cervical cancer, and a protective vaccine is available. Government figures show just 32 percent of teen girls have received all three doses, fewer than in Canada, Britain and Australia. The vaccine was recommended for U.S. boys about a year ago.

Among children, overall cancer death rates are dropping by 1.8 percent a year, but incidence is continuing to increase by just over half a percent a year. Brawley said it's not clear why.

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India says two soldiers killed in clash with Pakistan troops

SRINAGAR, India: Pakistani troops killed two Indian soldiers on Tuesday near the tense disputed border between the nuclear-armed neighbours in Kashmir and one of the bodies was badly mutilated, the Indian army said.

The firefight broke out at about noon on Tuesday (0630 GMT) after an Indian patrol discovered Pakistani troops about half a kilometre (1,600 feet) inside Indian territory, an army spokesman told AFP.

A ceasefire has been in place along the Line of Control that divides the countries since 2003, but it is periodically violated by both sides and Pakistan said Indian troops killed a Pakistani soldier on Sunday.

Relations had been slowly improving over the last few years following a rupture in their slow-moving peace process after the 2008 attacks on Mumbai, which were blamed by India on Pakistan-based militants.

"There was a firefight with Pakistani troops," army spokesman Rajesh Kalia told AFP from the mountainous Himalayan region.

"We lost two soldiers and one of them has been badly mutilated," he added, declining to give more details on the injuries.

"The intruders were regular (Pakistani) soldiers and they were 400-500 metres (1,300-1,600 feet) inside our territory," he said of the clash in Mendhar sector, 173 kilometres (107 miles) west by road from the city of Jammu.

In Islamabad, a Pakistan military spokesman denied what he called an "Indian allegation of unprovoked firing". He declined to elaborate.

On Sunday, Pakistan said Indian troops had crossed the Line of Control and stormed a military post. It said one Pakistani soldier was killed and another injured.

It lodged a formal protest with India on Monday over what it called an unprovoked attack.

India denied crossing the line, saying it had retaliated with small arms fire after Pakistani mortars hit a village home.

A foreign ministry spokesman said Indian troops had undertaken "controlled retaliation" on Sunday after "unprovoked firing" which damaged a civilian home.

The deaths are set to undermine recent efforts to improve relations, such as opening up trade and offering more lenient visa regimes which have been a feature of talks between senior political leaders from both sides.

Muslim-majority Kashmir is a Himalayan region which India and Pakistan both claim in full but rule in part. It was the cause of two of three wars between the neighbours since independence from Britain in 1947.

- AFP/fa

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Five accused in India rape case charged in court

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Five men accused of raping and murdering an Indian student were read the charges in a near-empty courtroom on Monday after the judge cleared out lawyers for bickering over whether the men deserved a defense.

The 23-year-old physiotherapy student died two weeks after being gang-raped and beaten on a moving bus in New Delhi, then thrown bleeding onto the street. Protests followed, along with a fierce public debate over police failure to stem rampant violence against women.

With popular anger simmering against the five men and a teenager accused in the case, most lawyers in the district where the trial will be held refuse to represent them.

Before the men arrived for a pre-trial hearing on Monday, heckling broke out in a chamber packed with jostling lawyers, journalists and members of the public after two of the lawyers, Manohar Lal Sharma and V. K. Anand, offered to defend the men.

"We are living in a modern society," declared Lal Sharma, defending his decision. "We all are educated. Every accused, including those in brutal offences like this, has the legal right ... to defend themselves."

One woman lawyer prodded V. K. Anand in the chest, saying: "I'll see how you can represent the accused."

Unable to restore order, presiding magistrate Namrita Aggarwal ordered everyone to leave except the prosecution, and set police to guard the entrance.

She said the trial would now be held behind closed doors because of the sensitivity of the case.

FACES COVERED

Reuters video images showed the men stepping out of a blue police van that brought them from Tihar jail and walking, their faces covered, through a metal detector into the South Delhi court building.

The court was across the street from the cinema where the victim watched a film before she was attacked on her way home.

Aggarwal gave the men copies of the charges, which include murder, rape and abduction, a prosecutor in the case told Reuters.

Police have conducted extensive interrogations and say they have recorded confessions, even though the men have no lawyers.

If the men, most of them from a slum neighborhood, cannot arrange a defense, the court will offer them legal aid before the trial begins.

Two of them, Vinay Sharma and Pawan Gupta, have offered to give evidence against the others - Mukesh Kumar, Ram Singh and Akshay Thakura - possibly in return for a lighter sentence.

Mohan, describing what he called a heinous crime, said: "The five accused persons deserve not less than the death penalty."

The case has sharpened long-standing anger against the government and police for a perceived failure to protect women.

A male friend who was assaulted with the woman on December 16 said on Friday that passers-by left her unclothed and bleeding in the street for almost an hour and that, when police arrived, they spent a long time arguing about where to take them.

The woman lived for two weeks after her attack, dying in a Singapore hospital where she had been taken for treatment.

FAST-TRACK COURT

Aggarwal said the next hearing would be on January 10. The case is due to move later to another, fast-track court set up since the woman was attacked to help reduce a backlog of sex crime cases in Delhi.

Legal experts say the lack of representation for the five men may give grounds for appeal if they are found guilty. Convictions in similar cases have often been overturned years later.

Some legal experts have also warned that previous attempts to fast-track justice in India in some cases led to imperfect convictions that were later challenged.

The sixth member of the group alleged to have lured the student and a male friend into the private bus is under 18 and will be tried in a separate juvenile court.

The government is aiming to lower the age at which teenagers can be tried as adults, acknowledging public anger that the boy will face a maximum three-year sentence.

The victim was identified by a British newspaper at the weekend but Reuters has opted not to name her.

Indian law generally prohibits the identification of victims of sex crimes. The law is intended to protect victims' privacy and keep them out of the glare of media in a country where the social stigma associated with rape can be devastating.

The dead woman's father repeated on Monday that he wanted her identified and said he would be happy to release a photograph of her.

"We don't want to hide her identity. There is no reason for that. The only condition is it should not be misused," he told Reuters.

He said he was confident the trial would be quick and reiterated a call that the perpetrators be hanged.

(Writing by Frank Jack Daniel; Editing by Robert Birsel and Tom Pfeiffer)

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Pune entrepreneur-activist writes to NCW, seeks action against Asaram Bapu

NEW DELHI: A Pune-based entrepreneur and activist Tehseen Poonawalla on Monday urged the National Commission for Women (NCW) to act against spiritual guru Asaram Bapu for blaming the 23-year-old gang-rape victim for the crime and derogatory remarks about women in general.

In a letter to the NCW, Poonawalla asked the body to move court or register a police complaint against the godman for his statements.

Asaram's remarks amount to "gross violation of legal, constitutional and fundamental rights and the right to dignity" of the gang-rape victim brutalized by six men in Delhi, Poonawalla said.

His comments on women in general violate various provisions of the law, including Indecent Representation of Women (Prohibition) Act and Section 505 (2) of the IPC as they "falsely and unjustifiably stereotype and portray women to be manipulators and conspirators against men and attempts to create an ill-will and enmity between men and women", said Poonawalla.

Section 505 (2) of the IPC deals with sstatements creating or promoting enmity, hatred or ill-will between classes and prescribes punishment of upto three years in jail.

Poonawalla also asked the NCW to issue an advisory to state governments and media to deny Asaram Bapu platform to propagate his "vitriolic beliefs and opinions".

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Organ donations fall in Germany after scandal

BERLIN (AP) — Organ donations have dropped sharply in Germany following a scandal over alleged corruption at several transplant clinics.

The German Foundation for Organ Transplantation says the number of organs donated fell almost 13 percent to 3,917 last year, the lowest figure in a decade.

Several German clinics are being investigated over allegations that doctors manipulated waiting lists to help some patients appear sicker than they were and so receive transplants sooner.

The foundation said Monday that the scandal had "massively shaken" the public's faith in the transplant system.

Some 12,000 people in Germany require organ transplants each year.

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