US economy grew slightly at end of 2012

THE US economy grew slightly in the fourth quarter last year, the government says, revising its prior estimate of a small contraction.

Gross domestic product grew at an annual rate of 0.1 per cent in the October-December period, the Commerce Department said in its second official estimate. In its initial estimate in January, GDP contracted by 0.1 per cent.

"While today's release has revised the direction of change in real GDP, the general picture of the economy for the fourth quarter remains largely the same as what was presented last month," the department said.

The revision did not change the growth rate for all of 2012 of 2.2 per cent, helped by a solid 3.1 per cent pace in the third quarter.

Scott Hoyt of Moody's Analytics said the scant growth in the revised reading "highlights the impact the budget negotiations in Washington and weakness of overseas economies have had on the US economy".

The slowdown reflected sharp drops in inventory building and federal government spending ahead of the January 1 "fiscal cliff" of across-the-board automatic tax hikes and spending cuts.

Private inventories and government spending each fell roughly 1.5 per cent.

A drop in exports, by 0.6 per cent, also contributed to the slower GDP growth.

Consumer spending, which drives about 70 per cent of US economic activity, was revised down a notch, to 2.1 per cent from 2.2 per cent.

Most analysts expected a stronger GDP reading of 0.5 per cent growth for the final quarter amid signs the economy was picking up in the first quarter.

"While not negative any more, the weakness in Q4 GDP still looks grossly exaggerated; other data, such as employment growth and the ISM indexes, suggest that the trend is at least 2.0 per cent, perhaps better than that," said Jim O'Sullivan, chief US economist at High Frequency Economics.

Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke, in testimony to Congress on Tuesday and Wednesday, warned economic growth remained uneven and could be further hurt by the government's steep budget cuts, or sequester, slated to take effect on Friday.

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US stocks dip on disappointing growth

US stocks have edged mostly lower after a fresh government estimate on economic growth in the fourth quarter came in lower than expected.

Five minutes into trade on Thursday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 17.11 points, or 0.12 per cent, to 14,058.26.

The broad-based S&P 500 retreated by 0.65 points, or 0.04 per cent, to 1,515.34.

The tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index nudged higher by 0.11 points to 3,162.36.

The trading came as the Commerce Department revised the fourth-quarter growth rate to a positive 0.1 per cent, instead of a contraction of 0.1 per cent. Economists had forecast a revision to 0.5 per cent.

Trade was also negatively affected by some disappointing results from JC Penney and other retailers.

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Pessimists live longer, study shows

OLDER people who look on the darker side of life tend to live longer than optimists, who in turn face an increased risk of illness and mortality, a new study by a German research institute has found.

Researchers in Germany and Switzerland found older people who believe their life satisfaction will be above average in future face a 10 per cent higher mortality risk or are more likely to develop physical health problems, the DIW think-tank said.

"It is possible that a pessimistic outlook leads elderly people to look after themselves and their health better and take greater precautions against risks," said one of the researchers, Frieder Lang.

"It seems that older people who have a low expectation of how contented they will be in future lead longer and healthier lives than those who believe their future is rosy," DIW said.

The study was conducted by a team from the Friedrich Alexander University of Erlangen-Nuernberg, the Berlin-based DIW as well as Humboldt University in Berlin and the University of Zurich.

They analysed long-term data compiled between 1993 and 2003 where the same people belonging to three different age groups were asked every year to assess their current level of life satisfaction and how contented they expected to be in five years.

Over the 10-year period the researchers checked with each participant six times whether their expected level of satisfaction tallied with reality five years on.

Results showed 25 per cent of older participants realistically estimated their future contentment, while around 43 per cent underestimated it and 32 per cent overestimated, the DIW said.

Young adults mostly had an unrealistically rosy view of their future while middle-aged people were largely spot on, it said.

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Fukushima cancer risk near plant: WHO

JAPAN'S 2011 Fukushima disaster raised the cancer risk for people living near the atomic plant, but no jump in cases is expected elsewhere, the UN's health agency says, sparking an angry reaction from anti-nuclear campaigners.

Within a 20km perimeter of the plant, rates of thyroid cancer among women who were exposed to radiation as infants were expected to be up to 1.25 per cent, the World Health Organisation said in a report.

This represented a 70 per cent increase over the baseline risk of thyroid cancer over a Japanese woman's lifetime, which is 0.75 per cent, the UN health agency noted.

"In view of the estimated exposure levels, an increased risk of cancer was the potential health impact of greatest relevance," Maria Neira, the WHO's director of public health and environment, told reporters as she launched the report on Thursday.

"Outside the most exposed areas, so outside of Fukushima prefecture, and even in some areas of Fukushima prefecture, the predicted risk remains low and even non-observable. That means we didn't observe any increase in cancer above what we call the natural variation in baseline rates," she explained.

Other forms of cancer also looked set to rise, albeit to a lesser extent, the agency said.

It pointed to a slightly higher risk of breast cancer among women exposed as infants, and of leukaemia among men.

Radiation doses from the stricken plant were not expected to cause an increase in miscarriages, stillbirths and physical and mental conditions that could affect babies born after the accident, the WHO said.

Senior WHO official Angelika Tritscher added: "In neighbouring countries and the rest of the world, the estimated increase in cancer risk is negligible. So there's no additional health risk expected due to the Fukushima accident."

Anti-nuclear campaigners slammed the report.

"The WHO's flawed report leaves its job half done," said Rianne Teule, Greenpeace International's nuclear radiation expert.

"The WHO report is clearly a political statement to protect the nuclear industry and not a scientific one with people's health in mind."

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Scientists link two rats' brains

CREATING a "superbrain" of connected minds, scientists say they have enabled a rat to help a fellow rodent while the animals were a continent apart but connected through brain electrodes.

With electrodes imbedded in its cortex, a rat in a research institute in Natal, Brazil sent signals via the internet to a counterpart at a university lab in Durham, North Carolina, helping the second animal to get a reward.

The exploit opens up the prospect of linking brains among animals to create an "organic computer", said Brazilian neurobiologist Miguel Nicolelis.

It also helps the quest to empower patients stricken with paralysis or locked-in syndrome, he said.

"We established a functional linkage between two brains. We created a superbrain that comprises two brains," Nicolelis said in a phone interview with AFP.

Published in the journal Scientific Reports, Nicolelis' team gave basic training to thirsty rats, who had to recognise lights and operate a lever to get a reward of water.

They then implanted ultra-fine electrodes in the rats' brains, which were linked by a slender overhead cable to a computer.

In a glass tank in Natal, the first rat was the "encoder", its brain sending out a stream of electrical pulses as it figured out the tricks for getting the reward.

The pulses were sent in real time into the cortex of the second rat, or "decoder", which was facing identical apparatus in a tank in North Carolina.

With these prompts from its chum, the decoder rat swiftly found the reward in turn.

This "suggests we could create a brain net, formed of joined-up brains, all interacting", the scientist said, hastening to stress that such experiments would only be conducted on lab animals, not humans.

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Scientists study Richard the Lionheart

FORENSIC scientists say they have delved into the embalmed heart of Richard the Lionheart, finding chemical evidence the remains of England's Crusader king were handled with holy reverence.

Reduced to dust by eight centuries, the heart of the legendary warrior was analysed by modern lab technology.

It indicates the organ was treated with the veneration reserved for a Christian relic, said Philippe Charlier of the Raymond Poincare University Hospital in Garches, near Paris.

"We found things that we didn't expect," said Charlier, one of the world's top historical pathologists.

Medieval embalmers used mercury and tar-like creosote to preserve the heart, then applied frankincense, myrtle, daisy and mint to it so that it would smell sweet, his team found.

The organ was then wrapped in linen and sealed for eternity inside a lead box.

"The frankincense is something we have never seen until now. It is a substance whose use comes directly from divine inspiration," he said in an interview with AFP.

"It was one of the three gifts brought by the Wise Men at Jesus's birth, and it was used by Joseph of Arimathea to help preserve Jesus's body at his death. So using it is a direct reference to Christ."

The probe, reported in the journal Scientific Reports, sheds light on the contemporary status of a king who across Western Europe became the emblem of gallantry.

Through today's prism, though, many historians say the Lionheart was a neglectful king and war mongerer who slaughtered thousands of hostages in his battle to wrest Jerusalem from Saladin.

King Richard I died in 1199 at 41 while fighting the French in Chalus, central France, where he was shot in the left shoulder by a crossbow arrow, reputedly fired by a boy.

He died 12 days later, presumably from septicaemia or gangrene, although some folk tales suggest the arrow was deliberately poisoned.

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S Africa to probe donkey meat scandal

SOUTH Africa has launched an "urgent" investigation into how unlabelled donkey, water buffalo and goat got into meat products sold in supermarkets.

The cabinet requested the probe after reports had created "alarm and panic" after the irregular ingredients were revealed in a university study.

"We will probably begin with the retailers themselves," acting National Consumer Commission commissioner Ebrahim Mohamed told reporters on Thursday.

"All in the supply chain can be held responsible and all will be subject to this investigation."

The study found that over two thirds of meat products tested contained undeclared ingredients.

The DNA-based study was sparked by the horse meat scandal in Europe.

Products will be tested and the commission would be working quickly, said Mohamed.

"We are going to push so that we can get finality on this matter," he said.

Stellenbosch University found that up to 68 per cent of 139 meat samples from shops and butcheries had irregular ingredients, with pork and chicken most often substituted for other meat.

Plant matter was also found in the minced meat, burger patties, sausages and deli and dried meat.

Europe has been battling its own food drama after horsemeat was found in so-called beef ready-made meals and burgers in several countries.

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