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Coronary bypass surgery LONDON, Mar 19: A new surgical device that eliminates the use of stitches could reduce the time and skill...more S
Dakota legislature WASHINGTON, Mar 19: The South Dakota legislature of the United States has unanimously....more Taliban
slaughter cows KABUL, Mar 19: Butchers with large machete-like knives slaughtered 12 cows today to distribute...more |
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Commonwealth Ministers discuss Pak, Zimbabwe, Fiji LONDON, Mar 19: Pakistan and Fiji headed the agenda today as the Commonwealth’s Ministerial ......more Blackwill emerges WASHINGTON, Mar 19: Robert D Blackwill, a career diplomat cum nuclear non-proliferation.....more Pak army top brass ISLAMABAD, Mar 19: The ongoing ceasefire in Jammu and Kashmir and situation along the Line of......more |
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Coronary bypass surgery without the needlework LONDON, Mar 19: A new surgical device that eliminates the use of stitches could reduce the time and skill needed to perform coronary bypass surgery, Swiss surgeons said today. The coronary-artery connector system allows surgeons to join the heart bloods vessels without the need for stitches. Professor Thierry Carrel and surgeons at University Hospital in Berne, who implanted the device in the first patient in November, believe it could transform bypass surgery and cut operating time from up to five hours to less than two. "It is a very important development for vascular and cardiac surgery. We have, for the first time, the ability to connect vessels in the heart without hand-suturing techniques," Carrel said in a telephone interview. The system not only can shorten the time required for surgery, it could also assure that every connection is similar and of the same quality. Carrel and his team used the device in a 61-year-old Angina patient having triple bypass surgery to join a coronary artery and vein graft to bypass blocked blood vessels. They describe the technique in a research letter on the lancet medical journal website (www.Thelancet.Com). Since the November operation they have used the connector in similar operations on 12 other patients. "With this technique you can make a connection within two or three minutes and every connection is the same. It is a small ring of stainless steel which puts the vessels together and holds them in place," Carrel explained. "It is really phenomenal. It is very haemostatic, you don’t have a drop of blood coming out. It’s very extraordinary." The connector is used during open-heart surgery but Carrel believes in the future surgeons will be able to implant it during keyhole surgery which will reduce operating and recovery times. He described the system, which was developed by the St Jude Medical Anastomotic Technology Group in Minneapolis, as one of the biggest developments in cardiac surgery in the past 20-30 years. Once surgeons learned the technique, which he said was not difficult, he predicted it would be possible to do every bypass with it. Coronary heart disease is a the leading killer in most industrialised countries. Smoking, high blood pressure and high cholesterol are leading risk factors. (REUTERS) |
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S Dakota
legislature supports return WASHINGTON, Mar 19: The South Dakota legislature of the United States has unanimously passed a proclamation describing the plight of minorities in Kashmir - including Pandits, Sikhs, Buddhists and Christians - as a "human tragedy" while affirming the right of the exiled minorities to return to their "homeland." The proclamation, signed by President of State Senate Carol Hillard and Speaker of the House Scott Eccarius, says: "Whereas, in accordance with international law, the non-Muslim minorities are entitled to return to their `homeland’, now, therefore, be it commemorated by the 76th legislature of the state of South Dakota, USA, that the plight of the Pandits, Sikhs, Buddhists and Christians exiled from Kashmir be recognized as a `human tragedy’ by all South Dakotans and the world community as a whole". The legislature has already gone on record supporting Panun Kashmir. Copies of the proclamation - co-sponsored by 10 state senators and 11 state representatives - have been sent to President George W Bush and the congressional leadership for further acton, Dr Jagan Kaul, Director of the Indo-American Kashmir Forum, said. He also thanked the South Dakota legislature and the legislators for their support to the cause Kashmiri minorities. (PTI) |
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Taliban slaughter cows to
atone for tardy KABUL, Mar 19: Butchers with large machete-like knives slaughtered 12 cows today to distribute to the poorest in Afghanistan’s beleaguered capital to atone for the delay in destroying two giant statues of Buddha in central Bamiyan. The 12 cows were the first of 100 cows which were ordered killed throughout the country by the Taliban’s reclusive leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar. He issued the order to slaughter the cows last weekend saying they would be sacrificed because of the tardy demolition of a 51-meter and a 36-meter statues of Buddha hewn from a cliff face in the 3rd and 5th centuries. It took Taliban soldiers nearly two weeks to destroy the giant mountain carvings after an order was issued by Omar declaring the statues idolatrous and against the tenets of Islam. Shortly after sunrise today in the courtyard of the once grand presidential palace in the heart of Kabul, 20 men in blood-soaked Shalwar Kameezes, put the meat into bags for distribution throughout the war-ruined city. "We are doing this on the order of Mullah Omar because of the delay in the destruction of the statues," said Abdullah, a Taliban soldier who, like most Afghans uses only one name. Abdullah was supervising the slaughter and later distribution. The remaining animals were to be slaughtered throughout the 95 per cent of Afghanistan controlled by the Taliban. The order to destroy the two towering statues as well as thousands of other priceless relics was issued after 400 clerics from across Afghanistan debated their survival. (AP) |
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Commonwealth Ministers discuss Pak, Zimbabwe, Fiji LONDON, Mar 19: Pakistan and Fiji headed the agenda today as the Commonwealth’s Ministerial Action Group met for a two-day session here, while concerns over Zimbabwe were also expected to get an airing. Zimbabwe is not actually on the official agenda at all, but will be brought up by Britain, sources close to the talks have said. But although there is likely to be a statement expressing concern over the situation in the Southern African nation, the group will not impose sanctions or order its suspension from the body, the sources added. Instead, it is more likely to agree to a British motion for a mission to be sent to Zimbabwe to report back on political and economic devel opments. Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer spoke of growing concern" at the situation in Zimbabwe, notably the harassment of the press, opposition and judiciary and the illegal occupation of white-owned farms. Pakistan is also suspended from the Council of the Commonwealth after military ruler General Pervez Musharraf seized power in October 1999. The action group will hear representations from political parties and civic organisations on the situation in Pakistan, Commonwealth officials said. They are likely to include former Premier Benazir Bhutto. Last year, Commonwealth chief Don Mckinnon warned that it would not revoke Pakistna’s supension until its rulers had restored democracy, which Musharraf had promised to do. (AFP) |
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Blackwill emerges front-runner
for US WASHINGTON, Mar 19: Robert D Blackwill, a career diplomat cum nuclear non-proliferation expert, has emerged as a front-runner for the post of US Ambassador to New Delhi, an indication that the Bush administration’s opposition to comprehensive test ban treaty did not mean the end of its concern regarding proliferation issues in India. While Mr Blackwill’s office in Harvard University declined to confirm the appointment, diplomatic sources here said he is among the front runners for the post. Mr Blackwill, who served as a senior foreign policy advisor for President George W Bush’s Presidential campaign, is the Belfer lecturer in international security at Harvard University’s John F Kennedy School of Government and teaches foreign and defence policy and qualitative public policy analysis. A former Associate Dean of the Kennedy School, he has been a faculty member of the school’s Chinese security studies programme, member of the Advisory Council of the Nixon Centre for Peace and Freedom and a consultant to the Rand Corporation and US Government agencies. (UNI) |
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Pak army top brass discusses Kashmir ceasefire ISLAMABAD, Mar 19: The ongoing ceasefire in Jammu and Kashmir and situation along the Line of Control (LoC) were among a host of issues discussed at a meeting of Pakistani army’s top brass held under the chairmanship of military ruler General Pervez Musharraf in Rawalpindi today. The international outcry over the destruction of Buddhist statues by the ruling Taliban militia in Afghanistan is also on the agenda of the two-day meeting of the Pakistan army’s Corps Commanders, which began today, official reports said. The reports said on the first day, the meeting today reviewed the geo-strategic environment in the region, situation along the LoC and recent developments in Kashmir, especially the three-month extension of ceasefire there. The meeting also discussed the grim economic situation arising out of Pakistan’s huge debt burden. Pakistan has applied for 10 billion dollar loan to tide over immediate crisis arising out of its servicing of 60 billion foreign and domestic debt. Gen Musharraf briefed his senior commanders on his recent tours to Saudi Arabia and Egypt and informed them about the deliberations at the just-concluded Pakistan Development Forum (PDF), consisting of members of Paris Club, which called for restoration of democracy in the country. Significantly, a special presentation was made by Mian Altaf Saleem, Minister for Privatisation Programme. The meeting was also attended by Finance and Commerce Ministers, official APP news agency said. Musharraf also informed the commanders about special measures being taken to quell the sectarian violence in the country. (PTI) |
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