Whites to become minority in U.S. by 2050: report

Non-Hispanic whites will become a minority in the United States by 2050, with immigrants and their children driving 82 percent of U.S. population growth in coming years, a new study said on Monday.

The U.S. population will grow to 438 million in 2050 from 296 million in 2005 if current population trends continue, the Pew Research Center study found.

Non-Hispanic whites would account for 47 percent of the total in 2050, it concluded.

By that time, one in every five Americans will be a foreign-born immigrant, compared to one in eight in 2005.

"Of the 117 million people added to the population in this period due to the effect of new immigration, 67 million will be the immigrants themselves and 50 million will be their U.S.-born children or grandchildren," the study said.

While the white population, with its lower fertility rate, ages, the Latino population, the nation's largest minority, will triple in size. Latinos will be responsible for 60 percent of the population growth until 2050.

They will account for 29 percent of the population, or 128 million in 2050, up from 14 percent now, the study said.

"The number of whites will increase, but only by 4 percent," said D'Vera Cohn, one of the report's authors.

The Asian population will almost double in percentage terms, from 5 to 9 percent, while blacks will remain around 13 percent of the total, the report said.

At the same time, the elderly population will more than double as the baby boom generation retires. The number of children and working-age people will grow more slowly.

Almost half of the new immigrants arriving the country will be from Latin American countries, said the other author of the study, Jeffrey S. Passel from the Pew Hispanic Center.

Healthy elderly lifestyle key to longer life

You're never too old to reap the benefits of a healthful lifestyle, according to researchers who found that doing things like exercising and not smoking at age 70 greatly raises one's chances of living to age 90.

The researchers focused on what people can do in their early elderly years to live longer while maintaining good health and physical function -- a vital issue as the population ages in the United States and many other countries.

For 25 years, they tracked about 2,400 male doctors whose average age was 72 when they entered the study in the early 1980s.

Those who exercised two to four times per week, did not smoke, maintained normal body weight and blood pressure, and avoided diabetes had a 54 percent chance of living to 90.

Doing any one or combination of them also were beneficial. But men who did none of them had only a 4 percent chance of reaching age 90, the researchers reported on Monday in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

"This isn't surprising so much as it's reassuring," said Dr. Laurel Yates of Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston, who led the study.

"All of these factors are considered common sense -- good medical management -- in terms of emphasizing: don't smoke, let's do blood pressure control and weight management, and do exercise," Yates said in a telephone interview.

'DON'T SMOKE, DO EXERCISE'

Yates said the lifestyle message commonly has been aimed at middle-aged people, so it is helpful to see that such lifestyle factors can also help the elderly add healthy years.

"Lifestyle changes are the hardest ones to make. It's a lot easier to take a pill. So the onus is on an individual," Yates said. "If you're going to ask what's the one thing that I could do, I would say do two things: don't smoke and do exercise."

The researchers also found that the men who lived to at least 90 enjoyed better physical function and mental well-being late in their lives than men who died at a younger age.

Yates said research has shown that genetics counts for only about 25 to 30 percent in determining how long people live, with other factors playing a bigger role.

"Most people would say they don't want to have extra years added to their life if those years are going to be ones of disability and disease. And I think it is reassuring that there is something a person can do to help increase the probability of having extra years that are good ones," Yates said.

Another study in the same journal, led by Dr. Dellara Terry of Boston University School of Medicine and Boston Medical Center, looked at 523 women and 216 men age 97 or older.

Terry's team found that about a third of these people got to this advanced age despite having developed age-associated disease before age 85 such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, dementia, diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, osteoporosis, Parkinson's disease or stroke.

Other recent research has quantified how certain behaviors affect longevity. British researchers who tracked 20,000 people said last month those who exercised, avoided smoking, drank moderately and ate lots of fruit and vegetables lived 14 years longer on average than people who did none of these things.

Autopsies forecast surge in U.S. heart disease

Autopsies of adults who died young of unnatural causes show many already had clogged arteries, U.S. and Canadian researchers said on Monday in a study that suggests heart disease may be on the upswing.

The researchers said their findings suggest a four-decade-long trend of declines in heart disease may be about to come to a screeching halt.

They studied autopsy reports from younger people in one Minnesota county who died from accidents, suicide and murder and found most had clogged arteries and more than 8 percent had significant disease.

"What they observed was a bit shocking," said S. Jay Olshansky of the University of Illinois at Chicago, who wrote an editorial on the research, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

"It is the most definitive evidence I've seen suggesting that today's younger and middle-aged generations may be heading for an increase in their risks of heart disease," he said.

The researchers from the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota and the University of British Columbia in Vancouver looked at autopsy data from residents of Olmsted County, Minnesota, who died between 1981 and 2004 from unnatural causes.

During that time, 8.2 percent of 425 people aged 16 to 64 had high-grade disease and 83 percent had the beginnings of coronary artery disease.

Mayo's Cynthia Leibson and colleagues found declines in the grade of coronary artery disease ended after 1995 and began to climb after 2000.

"Declines in coronary artery disease appear to have ended and there is some suggestion that they might be increasing," Leibson said in a telephone interview.

She said it is not yet clear to what extent obesity and diabetes contributed to this, but the researchers plan to study this in the same group of patients.

'PERFECT STORM'

Olshansky, in a telephone interview, said rates of heart disease in the United States climbed steadily in the 20th century until the 1960s, and then began falling, helped by changes in lifestyle and declines in smoking. But then, a confluence of changes occurred.

"It was more or less a perfect storm," he said, citing the introduction of computers and a more sedentary lifestyle, the growth of fast-food chains and larger portion sizes, reduced physical education in schools and increased consumption of high-fructose corn syrup.

"It led to this explosion of obesity," Olshansky said.

A second study in the same journal confirms the trends.

Dr. Philip Mellen of the Hattiesburg Clinic in Mississippi analyzed national diet and nutrition data from a large federal study to see if patients with high blood pressure were adhering to a diet known to help control high blood pressure, a known cause of heart attacks and strokes.

They looked at data collected from 1988-1994, a period before a study in 1997 showed a diet high in fruits, vegetables and low-fat dairy products could significantly lower blood pressure. They compared this to data from 1999 to 2004.

What they found was people with hypertension were eating worse, not better. "The dietary quality has deteriorated over the last 15 years," Mellen said in a telephone interview.

"In our study, the youngest age group was the age group with the worse disease," he said. "This age group will have major problems as they continue to age."

Heart attacks drop after Italy's smoking ban

Italy's 2005 smoking ban has led to a sharp fall in heart attacks, researchers reported on Monday in a finding they said shows that such laws really do improve public health.

Following the ban the number of heart attacks in men and women aged 35-64 -- people most likely to be exposed to smoke in cafes, bars and restaurants -- fell 11 percent, the researchers said.

The findings showed the health benefits of European smoking bans in public places, said Francesco Forastiere, an epidemiologist at the Rome Health Authority who led the study.

"Most of this change is due to the decreased impact of passive smoke," he said in a telephone interview. "This is ... important because it shows the impact of a health intervention that can be achieved in other countries."

Italy, Britain, Ireland and a number of other European countries have outlawed smoking in public places, and many health experts are urging the European Union to adopt an even wider ban.

The ban in Italy, where the researchers said about 30 percent of men and 20 percent of women smoke, prohibited smoking cigarettes in all indoor public places such as offices, retail shops, restaurants, pubs and discos.

STRONGLY ENFORCED

"Smoking bans should be extended to all possible countries and smoking bans in the workplace should be strongly enforced," the researchers wrote.

Writing in the American Heart Association journal Circulation, the researchers compared the rate of heart attacks from 2000 to 2004 to those occurring in the year after the ban was enforced.

The team analyzed hospital records and adjusted for heat waves, flu epidemics, air pollution and other factors that could have contributed to heart attacks. The researchers also took daily measurements on air quality in 40 public places.

"The smoking ban in Italy is working and having a real protective effect on population health," Forastiere said.

After the ban, cigarette sales also fell 5.5 percent but the researchers attributed the health benefits seen in the study to reduced exposure to passive smoke.

They said young men and women living in poorer areas appeared to have the greatest health benefit after the ban.

Smoking kills about four million people each year while about a quarter of deaths related to heart disease are due to cigarettes, according to the World Health Organisation.

Bread and butter matters

The cost of living, social issues, the crime rate and illegal immigrants - these are the issues that matter most to Malaysian voters, according to a survey conducted ahead of the general election.

These bread and butter issues are the prime concern of voters now.

Even hot issues like politics ranked lower than economic factors and crime.

The survey revealed that 96% of respondents were concerned with the current economic situation such as the rising cost of consumer goods, while 88% said they were worried about the incidents of crime in the country.

Dr Syed Arabi: 'Certainly the Government is not passive about these issues'
The opinion poll was commissioned by The Star and carried out by the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM). It involved 2,930 respondents and was conducted in 58 clusters in 12 states in the peninsula from Dec 8 to Dec 29 last year. The survey has a margin of error of less than 4%.

“Economic issues were considered important to Malaysians,” said the IIUM Dean of the Communications Department Prof Datuk Dr Syed Arabi Idid, who headed the survey.

“People are concerned over the rising prices of basic necessities and the high cost of living, especially with the looming global oil prices.

“Crime is also a worry to them,” he said yesterday.

However, Dr Syed Arabi said the Government did respond to these concerns.

He cited the National Price Council as one of the measures taken to tackle the rising prices of consumer items and cost of living. Under the price council, the Government announced recently that a national stockpile of essential goods like rice and cooking oil would be created to ensure that prices and supply remained stable at all times.

The price council, headed by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, will monitor, advise and oversee the government's price policy, competitive market structures and the efficiency of subsidy schemes.

The price council is also aimed at preventing unfair and collusive trade practices affecting supply and prices of essential goods and services, and eventually softening the impact of rising prices on the cost of living.

“The prime minister himself has gone to the ground to initiate measures to beef up security, such as rehiring capable retired police officers,” said Dr Syed Arabi.

Abdullah, who is also the Internal Security Minister, announced recently that there would be a police station at every corner, and more than 3,000 more patrol cars and 4,000 motorcycles would be deployed to combat crime.

He also said that 60,000 police personnel would be recruited, while the police department would rent shoplots to set up the police stations.

A total of 1,756 respondents were aged between 21 and 35, 1,181 respondents polled were in the 36-50 age group, and 719 respondents were those above 51 years old.

The third main concern of the respondents was the influx of foreigners into the country, with 40% regarding it as a problem.

This was followed by other concerns on politics, unity, the environment, internal and external threats, road traffic problems and leadership.

Prof Dr Syed Arabi said 2% of respondents expressed concern over internal and external threats and considered the rising number of vehicles as a bane, while only 1% said leaders must be proven to be capable.

FACTBOX - Key facts about the U.S. State of the Union

When U.S. President George W. Bush gives his State of the Union speech on Monday, he will continue a constitutionally mandated tradition begun over 200 years ago by George Washington.

Following are some key facts about presidential State of the Union messages:

ORIGINS:

* State of the Union messages to Congress by the president are required by Article II, Section 3 of the U.S. Constitution which says, "He shall from time to time give to the Congress information of the state of the union, and recommend to their consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient."

* The State of the Union has become an annual speech given before a joint session of Congress in the House of Representatives chamber at the U.S. Capitol.

* George Washington gave the first State of the Union speech on Jan. 8, 1790 in New York City, then the provisional U.S. capital.

* Starting with Thomas Jefferson's first State of the Union in 1801 until William Howard Taft's last message in 1912, the State of the Union was a written report sent to Congress. Woodrow Wilson resumed the tradition of giving the State of the Union message in a speech to Congress.

* The phrase "State of the Union" did not become widely used until after 1935, when Franklin Roosevelt started using the term.

* SOME QUOTES:

- "We look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms. The first is freedom of speech and expression -- everywhere in the world. The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way -- everywhere in the world. The third is freedom from want -- which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants -- everywhere in the world. The fourth is freedom from fear." -- Franklin Roosevelt, Jan. 6, 1941.

- "As you know, I have provided to the special prosecutor voluntarily a great deal of material. I believe that I have provided all the material that he needs to conclude his investigations ... I believe the time has come to bring that investigation and the other investigations of this matter to an end. One year of Watergate is enough." -- Richard Nixon, Jan. 30, 1974.

- "Yes, we will have our differences. But let us always remember -- what unites us far outweighs whatever divides us. Those who sent us here to serve them -- the millions of Americans watching and listening tonight -- expect this of us. Let's prove to them and to ourselves that democracy works even in an election year." -- Ronald Reagan, Jan. 25, 1988.

- "Some time in the next 10 to 20 years, the major security threat this country will face will come from the enemies of the nation state: the narco-traffickers and the terrorists and the organized criminals, who will be organized together, working together, with increasing access to ever-more sophisticated chemical and biological weapons." -- Bill Clinton, Jan. 27, 2000.

- "States like these, (Iran, Iraq and North Korea) and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world. By seeking weapons of mass destruction, these regimes pose a grave and growing danger. They could provide these arms to terrorists, giving them the means to match their hatred. They could attack our allies or attempt to blackmail the United States. In any of these cases, the price of indifference would be catastrophic." -- George W. Bush, Jan 29, 2002

Under-the-tongue vaccine may be best to lick flu

Administering flu vaccines under the tongue may be more effective and offer more protection than injecting or inhaling the drug, a study with mice in South Korea has found.

"It (the base of the mouth) is a very good absorbent and competent tissue ... in taking vaccine and presenting it to the immune system ... to initiate an immune response," Cecil Czerkinsky, biological sciences professor at the Seoul National University, said in a telephone interview.

There is currently no vaccine that is administered under the tongue, or what is known as the sublingual area.

But there have been recent studies testing its effectiveness in inducing immune responses in mucosal tissues in the respiratory system, gut and inside of the cheek, and blood.

In an article published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the researchers described how they administered both live and killed flu vaccines under the tongues of mice and then exposed the rodents a few weeks later to lethal doses of influenza viruses.

"All the mice were protected ... they (vaccines) also gave cross-protection to other flu viruses," Czerkinsky said.

Unlike injected vaccines, which induce antibody production mainly in the blood, the sublingual method "induced antibodies in both lungs (mucosal lining) and the blood," he said.

"Influenza is a mucosal disease. That (sublingual method) is better because then you tackle the infection at the very early stage before the infection (goes to the blood)."

Such a method is different from the oral route, often seen as subjecting drugs to the erosive effects of digestive fluids.

The correct way to do it would be for the person to hold the vaccine in the base of the mouth for about 30 seconds.

"In 30 seconds, the sublingual area absorbs the vaccine and immediately the vaccine is taken up and processed by the immune system and it initiates very rapid stimulation of antibodies, within days," Czerkinsky said.

The study also suggested that this method may be safer than administering vaccines intranasally, or through inhaling.

There are nerve fibres in the nose, which opens up the possibility, however rare, that viruses in vaccines could enter the central nervous system, the researchers said.

Control groups of mice were given vaccines intranasally. The scientists later detected virus in the olfactory nerves of mice that were given vaccines containing killed viruses, which raised safety questions.

Mice that were given vaccines containing live, attenuated virus intranasally all died very quickly.

The scientists plan to conduct a clinical study later this year.

Black Death did not kill indiscriminately

The Black Death that decimated populations in Europe and elsewhere during the middle of the 14th century may not have been a blindly indiscriminate killer, as some experts have believed.

An analysis of 490 skeletons from a London for Black Death victims demonstrated that the infection did not affect everyone equally, two U.S. scientists said on Monday.

While many perfectly healthy people certainly were cut down, those already in poor health prior to the arrival of the plague were more likely to have perished, they found.

"A lot of people have assumed that the Black Death killed indiscriminately, just because it had such massive mortality," anthropologist Sharon DeWitte of the University at Albany in New York, said in a telephone interview.

People already in poor health often are more vulnerable in epidemics. "But there's been a tradition of thinking that the Black Death was this unique case where no one was safe and if you were exposed to the disease that was it. You had three to five days, and then you were dead," DeWitte said.

The plague epidemic of 1347 to 1351 was one of the deadliest recorded in human history, killing about 75 million people, according to some estimates, including more than a third of Europe's population.

DeWitte analyzed skeletons unearthed from the East Smithfield cemetery in London, dug especially for plague victims and excavated in the 1980s, for bone and teeth abnormalities that would show that people had health problems before they died of plague.

She found such abnormalities in many skeletons, suggesting these people had experienced malnutrition, iron deficiencies and infections well before succumbing to the Black Death.

The proportion of people with such signs of frailty in the cemetery, compared to those who appeared to have been of robust health before the epidemic, indicated that the infection was somewhat selective in who it killed, DeWitte and Pennsylvania State University anthropologist James Wood reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Some experts have thought the Black Death -- named after the black spots the bubonic form of the plague caused on the skin -- killed indiscriminately regardless of age, sex or level of health because it was so virulent and the European population so immunologically unprepared, DeWitte and Wood wrote.

"The Black Death was highly virulent and undoubtedly killed many otherwise healthy people who would have been unlikely to die under normal-mortality conditions," they wrote. But people already in poor health were more likely to die, they wrote.

Many scientists think the plague was caused by Yersinia pestis, a bacterial disease spread by fleas from rats. It still kills between 100 and 200 people a year.

The Black Death pandemic thought to have begun in Asia, then spread into the Middle East, Africa and Europe.

"On average, it killed between 30 to 50 percent of affected populations. But we know that there were some areas where mortality was even higher. So there would have been villages that were completely wiped out," DeWitte said.

Other experts now think the Black Death may have been caused not by bubonic plague but by a viral hemorrhagic fever, similar to the disease caused by the Ebola or dengue viruses.

Black Death did not kill indiscriminately

The Black Death that decimated populations in Europe and elsewhere during the middle of the 14th century may not have been a blindly indiscriminate killer, as some experts have believed.

An analysis of 490 skeletons from a London for Black Death victims demonstrated that the infection did not affect everyone equally, two U.S. scientists said on Monday.

While many perfectly healthy people certainly were cut down, those already in poor health prior to the arrival of the plague were more likely to have perished, they found.

"A lot of people have assumed that the Black Death killed indiscriminately, just because it had such massive mortality," anthropologist Sharon DeWitte of the University at Albany in New York, said in a telephone interview.

People already in poor health often are more vulnerable in epidemics. "But there's been a tradition of thinking that the Black Death was this unique case where no one was safe and if you were exposed to the disease that was it. You had three to five days, and then you were dead," DeWitte said.

The plague epidemic of 1347 to 1351 was one of the deadliest recorded in human history, killing about 75 million people, according to some estimates, including more than a third of Europe's population.

DeWitte analyzed skeletons unearthed from the East Smithfield cemetery in London, dug especially for plague victims and excavated in the 1980s, for bone and teeth abnormalities that would show that people had health problems before they died of plague.

She found such abnormalities in many skeletons, suggesting these people had experienced malnutrition, iron deficiencies and infections well before succumbing to the Black Death.

The proportion of people with such signs of frailty in the cemetery, compared to those who appeared to have been of robust health before the epidemic, indicated that the infection was somewhat selective in who it killed, DeWitte and Pennsylvania State University anthropologist James Wood reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Some experts have thought the Black Death -- named after the black spots the bubonic form of the plague caused on the skin -- killed indiscriminately regardless of age, sex or level of health because it was so virulent and the European population so immunologically unprepared, DeWitte and Wood wrote.

"The Black Death was highly virulent and undoubtedly killed many otherwise healthy people who would have been unlikely to die under normal-mortality conditions," they wrote. But people already in poor health were more likely to die, they wrote.

Many scientists think the plague was caused by Yersinia pestis, a bacterial disease spread by fleas from rats. It still kills between 100 and 200 people a year.

The Black Death pandemic thought to have begun in Asia, then spread into the Middle East, Africa and Europe.

"On average, it killed between 30 to 50 percent of affected populations. But we know that there were some areas where mortality was even higher. So there would have been villages that were completely wiped out," DeWitte said.

Other experts now think the Black Death may have been caused not by bubonic plague but by a viral hemorrhagic fever, similar to the disease caused by the Ebola or dengue viruses.

Snoring can lead to bronchitis

People who snore are more likely to develop chronic bronchitis, the hacking cough most often associated with cigarette smoking or breathing polluted air, Korean researchers reported on Monday.

Why snoring might lead to bronchitis is not clear, said a team led by Inkyung Baik of Korea University Ansan Hospital in South Korea.

The report, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, covered 4,270 men and women between 2001 and 2006. Of the group, 314 came down with chronic bronchitis.

"We collected information on snoring at baseline and identified incident cases of chronic bronchitis during a four-year follow-up period," Baik's team wrote.

After taking into account whether those in the study smoked or were otherwise at risk for bronchitis, the investigators concluded that people who snored five nights a week or less were 25 percent more likely to develop bronchitis than those who never snored.

The risk was 68 percent higher for those who snored six to seven times a week.

"Our findings provide support for the hypothesis that snoring is associated with chronic bronchitis," the researchers wrote.

It could be that snoring vibrates the upper airways, stressing them and leading to inflammation, the researchers said.

Rates of diabetes among U.S. elderly rose

More elderly Americans are contracting diabetes and the majority develop complications such as heart disease that might be prevented if they properly monitored their health, a researcher said on Monday.

The study of Medicare beneficiaries found 2.7 percent of a group of 1.5 million enrollees in the government-funded insurance program for the elderly were diagnosed with diabetes in 2003, compared to 2.2 percent diagnosed in 1994.

Overall, one-quarter of those 65 or older had type-2 diabetes in 2003, up from 15 percent in 1994, the report said. The 1.5 million people studied represented a group of 5 percent of Medicare enrollees whose health is being tracked by the program.

"The prevalence of diabetes mellitus is increasing, in part because of population aging, but also in younger persons," Frank Sloan of Duke University Medical Center in Durham, North Carolina, and colleagues wrote in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

Making matters worse, nine out of 10 of those diagnosed with diabetes in 1994 and 1999 developed some other ailment within six years of diagnosis, against seven out of 10 of elderly without diabetes who were studied for comparison purposes.

Diabetes damages blood circulation and is known to increase the risks of heart disease, blindness and skin ulcers, among other ailments.

"What we're concerned about is the rate of complications," Sloan said in a telephone interview.

"Our overall conclusion is they're not getting any better" over time, he said, citing increasing cases of kidney function deterioration and lower extremity problems, which can result in foot amputations.

"It shouldn't be happening if you're monitoring your blood pressure, your cholesterol, keeping your blood glucose in line, getting your eyes checked, getting your feet checked, so the complications can be caught and monitored," he said.

Rates of congestive heart failure, heart attack and stroke remained fairly stable at about three out of 10 people diagnosed with diabetes in 1994, 1999, and 2003.

Roughly one-third of diabetics diagnosed in 1994 and 1999 died within six years, compared to one-fourth of non-diabetics. For those surviving with the disease, the accumulation of other ailments places heavy burdens on the health care system, the report said.

"The message is how can we encourage people to adhere to recommended care and reduce these complications," Sloan said. "It's not an issue of uninsured people. (The elderly) frequently go to the doctor but we're not making inroads in terms of postponing these complications the way we should be."

Global unemployment rate to climb in 2008 - ILO

More people will be out of work in 2008 as a result of global economic cooling, and any major slowdown could cause disruption and further hike unemployment, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) said on Thursday.

In a report issued in the wake of heavy losses in world stock markets, and amid growing fears of worldwide recession, the United Nations agency said the world unemployment rate would climb to 6.1 percent this year from 6.0 percent in 2007.

Jose Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs, head of the ILO's employment sector, said the jitters that bled world markets this week had not yet trickled through to employment figures, which are considered a lagging indicator of world economic health.

But he said the 2008 projections may turn out to be overly bright if the world economy expands by less than the 4.8 percent estimated by the International Monetary Fund.

"This scenario ... would obviously be worse if global growth turns out to be less than predicted," Salazar-Xirinachs told a news briefing in Geneva, where the ILO is headquartered.

"It is very likely that there will be revisions of rates of growth downward," he said.

In its Global Employment Trends report, the ILO estimated that 3 billion people aged 15 and older had jobs in 2007, up nearly 2 percent from the year before and more than 17 percent higher than in 1997.

There were 190 million unemployed in 2007.

Among those employed, about 487 million people did not earn enough to lift themselves and their families above the $1-a-day poverty line, and 1.3 billion earned less than $2 a day.

"Despite working, more than 4 out of 10 workers are poor," the report concluded.

ILO economist Dorothea Schmidt said that productivity gains during the recent period of strong global economic growth meant there were fewer jobs created than necessary to create a cushion for any rocky period ahead.

"We have not created enough decent jobs," Schmidt told reporters. "The lack of productive jobs could mean a constraint for development during difficult times."

In addition to looming economic trouble, the ILO said rapid technological advances would present a major challenge for workers in the year ahead, particularly in rich markets such as the United States, Europe and Japan where jobs are increasingly being moved to poorer countries with cheaper labour costs.

"It is important for workers to be ready and able to adjust quickly to change and stiffer competition," the report said. "This can be fostered by not only giving them the right skills, but also giving them a feeling of security to handle the mental stress caused by changes."

Global unemployment rate to climb in 2008 - ILO

More people will be out of work in 2008 as a result of global economic cooling, and any major slowdown could cause disruption and further hike unemployment, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) said on Thursday.

In a report issued in the wake of heavy losses in world stock markets, and amid growing fears of worldwide recession, the United Nations agency said the world unemployment rate would climb to 6.1 percent this year from 6.0 percent in 2007.

Jose Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs, head of the ILO's employment sector, said the jitters that bled world markets this week had not yet trickled through to employment figures, which are considered a lagging indicator of world economic health.

But he said the 2008 projections may turn out to be overly bright if the world economy expands by less than the 4.8 percent estimated by the International Monetary Fund.

"This scenario ... would obviously be worse if global growth turns out to be less than predicted," Salazar-Xirinachs told a news briefing in Geneva, where the ILO is headquartered.

"It is very likely that there will be revisions of rates of growth downward," he said.

In its Global Employment Trends report, the ILO estimated that 3 billion people aged 15 and older had jobs in 2007, up nearly 2 percent from the year before and more than 17 percent higher than in 1997.

There were 190 million unemployed in 2007.

Among those employed, about 487 million people did not earn enough to lift themselves and their families above the $1-a-day poverty line, and 1.3 billion earned less than $2 a day.

"Despite working, more than 4 out of 10 workers are poor," the report concluded.

ILO economist Dorothea Schmidt said that productivity gains during the recent period of strong global economic growth meant there were fewer jobs created than necessary to create a cushion for any rocky period ahead.

"We have not created enough decent jobs," Schmidt told reporters. "The lack of productive jobs could mean a constraint for development during difficult times."

In addition to looming economic trouble, the ILO said rapid technological advances would present a major challenge for workers in the year ahead, particularly in rich markets such as the United States, Europe and Japan where jobs are increasingly being moved to poorer countries with cheaper labour costs.

"It is important for workers to be ready and able to adjust quickly to change and stiffer competition," the report said. "This can be fostered by not only giving them the right skills, but also giving them a feeling of security to handle the mental stress caused by changes."

In U.S., plastic shopping bag still rules

Australia and China are phasing them out, Germany and Ireland tax them, but in the United States, the plastic shopping bag is still king.

Outside supermarkets across the country, Americans push shopping carts laden with a dozen or more plastic bags full of groceries to their cars. Even the smallest purchase, such as a magazine at a newsstand, seems to come in a plastic bag.

Americans use 100 billion plastic shopping bags a year, according to Washington-based think tank Worldwatch Institute, or more than 330 a year for every person in the country. Most of them are thrown away.

A handful of U.S. cities and states have made moves to cut that number and Whole Foods Market, a supermarket pitched at the organic and natural food shopper, on Tuesday said it would phase out plastic bags out by Earth Day on April 22. But critics say the United States is years behind countries in Europe, Asia and Africa.

"We are still in the stage of taking baby steps," said Eric Goldstein, a director of the Natural Resources Defense Council, a U.S. environmental group.

Plastic bags, favored because they are durable and cheap, have been blamed for clogging drains, filling landfills and choking wildlife. They can take from 400 to 1,000 years to break down, and their constituent chemicals remain in the environment long after that, environmental groups say.

Made from crude oil, natural gas and other petrochemical derivatives, an estimated 12 million barrels of oil are used to make the bags the U.S. consumes each year.

Countries from Taiwan to Uganda, and cities including Dhaka in Bangladesh, have either banned plastic bags outright or impose a levy on consumers. Australia aims to phase them out by the end of this year, and China by June 21.

Ireland charges shoppers 22 Euro cents ($0.29 cents) per bag, a move credited with reducing plastic bag use by 90 per cent. Some European cities first imposed fees as early as the 1980s.

In Britain, which uses 13 billion single-use plastic bags a year, or more than 200 per person, Prime Minister Gordon Brown has urged the country's biggest supermarket chains to cut use faster than planned and said Britain can eliminate them altogether.

DISMAL SITUATION

But in the United States, the federal government has been reluctant to impose measures that would interfere with competition and be unpopular with consumers.

"Pay for bags? I think we have to pay for enough," said Melvin Perry, a shopper with four or five bags in each hand coming out of a Pathmark supermarket in Brooklyn, a borough of New York city.

Kaitlyn Tycek, pushing a shopping cart full of groceries in plastic bags, said they are so thin that items must be double- and triple-bagged to avoid splitting.

"They end up using three or four bags. They are pointless," said Tycek, who said she would switch to reusable cloth bags given the right incentives such as discounts for customers who bring their own bags.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency encourages reduced use, but does not say how it should be done. "Like most waste management decisions, this is one that is made on the local level," said spokeswoman Roxanne Smith.

While reusable cloth bags have gained pockets of popularity, cashiers at most supermarkets still offer "paper or plastic" and the answer is as often as not "plastic."

The few local governments that have taken up the cause favor recycling programs rather than taxes or outright bans.

A law already enacted in California and one just passed in New York City requires stores to set up recycling programs, but critics say they have little faith that shoppers use them.

The average American family of four throws away about 1,500 bags a year, and less than one percent of bags are recycled, according to Swedish furniture giant Ikea. Last March, Ikea introduced a 5-cent charge for each disposable plastic bag, which it credited with cutting usage by a half.

San Francisco became the first and only U.S city to impose an outright ban on plastic grocery bags in April, but the ban is limited to large supermarkets. The state of New Jersey is mulling phasing out plastic bags by 2010.

"It is a pretty dismal situation," said Lisa Mastny of the Worldwatch Institute.

GOVT. & CORPORATE CHANGE

The U.S. plastics and supermarket industries say outright bans lead to a return to paper bags, which cause their own environmental problems. It takes more energy to recycle a paper bag than a plastic bag, according to the plastics industry.

"You have to ask what is the objective? If it is for the environment, then you are not going to achieve that goal," said Karen Meleta, spokeswoman for ShopRite, a U.S. supermarket chain that offers recycling containers and 2 cents back for customers who reuse plastic bags.

Tara Raddohl, a spokesperson for Wal-Mart Stores Inc , the world's largest retailer, said its U.S. stores had recycling containers and has begun selling reusable bags for $1. She declined to say whether there was a specific target for reducing usage like its British subsidiary, Asda.

But environmentalists say recycling and rebates do not curb use and it is up to all levels of government to encourage reduction. "They need to set up convenient mechanisms for that public shift to happen," Goldstein of the Natural Resources Defense Council said.

In pockets of the United States, the reusable cloth shopping bag has become popular and even trendy, but in most supermarkets cashiers still offer "Paper or plastic?" And, as often as not, the answer is "plastic."

"The mentality in America is plastic bags come from plastic bag land," said Mastny, of the Worldwatch Institute. "We don't think about where they come from and where they are going."

More crimes last year, but fewer violent ones

The crime index increased by 7% last year but the number of violent crimes, especially armed robberies and robberies without firearms, dropped significantly.

Acting CID director Deputy Commissioner Datuk Acryl Sani Abdulah Sani said the main reason for the increase in the crime index was the rising number of property crimes, especially motorcycle theft.

“The number of murder cases too dropped from 606 in 2006 to 588 last year while rape cases increased by 29% from 2,454 cases in 2006 to 3,177 for the corresponding period last year.

“We are doing our best and will continue to do more patrols on foot, motorcycles and patrol cars,” he said.

DCP Acryl said the police had reduced the number of crime types in the index, from 18 to 14.

He said crimes like molestation, extortion, criminal intimidation and rioting (brawl involving at least five people) that was included in 2006 to reflect part of the crime index had been removed.

“There is no cover-up here as Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, during Tuesday’s crime briefing, clearly said that we must be transparent and present the truth to the public,” he said.

DCP Acryl also said another reason for the rise in crimes reported was due to the confidence the public had in the police now.

He said it was the policy of the police to investigate all reports lodged and anyone who was turned away or given the runaround should contact the police control centre and provide the duty officer with details of when, where and by whom they were mistreated.

Abdullah had said on Tuesday during the briefing that the people must be kept informed of the actual crime situation and be told the truth.

“The people must be safe at all times and not live in fear of being a victim of crime,” he said.

The Prime Minister, who is also Internal Security Minister, expressed concern over the crime situation and his seriousness in wanting to fight crime.

He approved on-the-spot allocations for the police to purchase vehicles, hire retired policemen, and lease or rent shoplots for use as police stations.