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Flu season is intensifying in the U.S. with more than six million cases confirmed so far, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported on Monday. The federal health agency said in a weekly update it has already recorded more than 53,000 hospitalizations and 29,000 deaths from the flu this season, as of the week ending Nov. 19. Twelve children have died from the flu so far, the CDC said, and the cumulative hospitalization rate is the highest it’s been at this point in the flue season since the 2010-2011 one. The CDC recommends that everyone aged 6 months...

"We've had a unilateral move higher [in stocks] to start things off and people are realizing this is not sustainable," one strategist said. The Dow and S&P 500 posted their worst session of the year on Monday. Long-dated Treasury yields climbed further on Tuesday, with the U.S. 10-year Treasury yield trading near levels not seen since 2014, amid fears of higher The S&P 500 pulled back 0.9 percent, with health care as the worst-performing sector. The Nasdaq composite fell 1 percent. "We've had a unilateral move higher [in stocks] to start things off and people are realizing this is not...

The Instituto Geografico Nacional (IGN) has reported an increase in the intensity of earthquakes recorded on El Hierro, the smallest of The Canary Islands, during the last 24 to 36 hours. The number of earthquakes recorded since July 17 , 2011 on El Hierros has now reached 10,000, figures from the IGN confirm. The IGN also confirmed surface deformations exceeding 35mm on the 280-sqkm island, where residents have been put on alert for a possible volcanic eruption. However, seismologists have moved to reassure the local population that a volcanic eruption is not imminent. The agency confirmed on Friday that 890...

REYKJAVIK (Reuters) – A volcanic eruption in Iceland, which has thrown up a 6-km (3.7 mile) high plume of ash and disrupted air traffic across northern Europe, has grown more intense, an expert said on Thursday. The eruption under the Eyjafjallajokull glacier continued to spew large amounts of ash and smoke into the air and showed no signs of abating after 40 hours of activity, said Pall Einarsson, a geophysicist at the University of Iceland. "The seismographs are showing that since this morning the intensity of the eruption seems to be growing," he said. Hot fumes had melted up to...

Reporting from Sacramento -- The battle over California prison inmates' constitutional rights has come down to this: finger-pointing over who dreamed up the idea of giving convicted criminals taxpayer-funded bingo and yoga rooms. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and state Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown have lambasted effortsby J. Clark Kelso, the court-appointed overseer of prison healthcare, to spend $8 billion on a "gold-plated utopian hospital plan" for 10,000 inmates. It features a "holistic" environment with natural light and space for yoga, music, horticulture and art therapy. On Tuesday, Kelso fired back, saying that the facilities are meant for mentally ill inmates, and...

The Department of Consumer Affairs has assigned a manager with a long history of fixing troubled bureaucracies to begin the task of cleaning up the Board of Chiropractic Examiners. The board has been roiled by disclosures of impropriety and infighting for several weeks. Capitol Weekly also has learned that the former chairwoman of the board, Dr. Sharon Ufberg, was accused of practicing without a license while sitting on the board during 2001. The allegations were among those detailed in one of two lawsuits pending against board managers by current and former staff members. Reached by phone in New York, Ufberg...

WASHINGTON - The Justice Department ordered House officials to "preserve all records" related to disgraced Rep. Mark Foley (news, bio, voting record)'s electronic correspondence with teenagers, intensifying an investigation into a scandal rocking Republicans five weeks before midterm elections. The development came as a congressional aide who counseled Foley to resign last week submitted his own resignation Wednesday. "I never attempted to prevent any inquiries or investigation," Kirk Fordham said in a statement. Fordham was once Foley's chief of staff. At the time of his resignation he had been serving in the same capacity for Rep. Tom Reynolds, R-N.Y., a...

BEIRUT, Lebanon - Israel and Hezbollah sharply intensified fighting with a blitz of airstrikes, dozens of rocket attacks and brutal ground combat on Saturday, each apparently trying to inflict as much damage as possible to strengthen their bargaining positions. In a sign of progress on the diplomatic front, the United States and France agreed on a U.N. Security Council resolution that calls for the fighting to end but would let Israel defend itself if attacked. Israeli commandos battled Hezbollah guerrillas in a raid on an apartment building in the southern port city of Tyre, while warplanes blasted south Beirut. The...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 7, 2005 – The 60,000 U.S. military forces on the ground in the hurricane-decimated Gulf Coast region are carrying out President Bush's priorities -- saving, then sustaining lives -- before getting to the tasks of recovery and reconstruction, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Sept. 6 during an interview on Fox News Channel. Rumsfeld, who traveled to the region Sept. 4 to observe operations firsthand, addressed the "enormous effort going on down there" as 1,800 members of the 82nd Airborne Division and more than 1,600 1st Cavalry Division troops were joining the Hurricane Katrina relief operation. This brings to...

Search intensifies for missing Citrus County girl Friday, February 25, 2005 Over 100 federal, state and local law officers are taking part, as the search for Jessica Lunsford continues. The 9-year-old was last seen about 10 p.m. Wednesday. That's when authorities said her grandparents put her to bed in their Homosassa home. They said her father Mark, who also lives there, returned home early Thursday to find her missing. Today, authorities are beefing up the search for Lunsford. "We've activated the CART Team which is the Child Abduction Response Team from the Tampa area," Citrus County Sheriff Jeff Dawsey said....

Fears of violence grow as face-off intensifies By Julius Strauss in Kiev and David Rennie in Washington (Filed: 25/11/2004) Ukrainian authorities defied growing pressure from the West and the demands of tens of thousands of anti-government protesters yesterday by declaring Viktor Yanukovich, the pro-Russia candidate, the winner of bitterly-disputed weekend elections. The announcement deepened the country's political crisis and raised fresh fears of violent clashes. Viktor Yushchenko, the opposition leader, had earlier accused the authorities of carrying out a coup d'etat. Mr Yushchenko said a coup had been accomplished by "rigging the elections'' and that thousands of violations of election...

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Fifty days out from the US presidential election, the rhetoric is becoming nastier between George W. Bush and Democratic challenger John Kerry (news - web sites), as the US president's lead appears to be solidifying. Kerry slammed Bush's campaign tactics, saying he "will say anything and do anything to get elected and hold on to power" in an interview in the Monday edition of Time magazine. Kerry was especially angered over a barrage of television ads aimed at discrediting his Vietnam War service, which are widely credited with the downward slide in his polling numbers. "I think...

Hunt intensifies for al-Qa'ida suspect By Andrew Buncombe in Washington 16 May 2003 The international hunt is intensifying for an alleged senior al-Qa'ida operative charged with playing a central role in the bombing of two US embassies in East Africa and the attack on an Israeli-owned hotel in Mombassa after he was reportedly sighted in neighbouring Somalia. His sighting - and the fear that he may be planning further attacks - appears to have been central to the security alerts which led British Airways to suspend its flights to Kenya. Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, a Comoros islander also known as Harun,...