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A.M. Costa Rica's Second news page |
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San
José, Costa Rica, Friday,
Aug. 22, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 166
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Foundation
honors victim of amoebas
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The U.S. family of the 11-year-old boy who died after contracting a brain-devouring amoeba from a Costa Rican hot spring in June has set up a foundation for combating related infections in the future. The Jordan Smelski Foundation for Amoeba Awareness began in honor of young Jordan Smelski who died July 2 from the very rare primary amebic meningoencephalitis, according to the foundation's Web site. This infection stems from the naegleria fowleri, which is known as the “brain-eating amoeba” and is often found in freshwater sources and hot springs in warmer climates. Doctors initially misdiagnosed the boy's symptoms of vomiting, headaches, and hallucinations as meningitis. Now the family is trying to spread the word of this rare disease so that it not only gets attention within the general public, but also within medical circles. According to the Centers for Disease Control, the naegleria fowleri commonly enters through the nose of someone who dips their head under a contaminated portion of warm freshwater. Costa Rican health officials have not yet released information into which hot spring resort the Smelskis visited. Jordan was the only son of Shelly and Steve Smelski, who live in Sanford, Florida. Donations and volunteer opportunities can be found directly on the foundation Web page at jcsfoundation.com. Big cats featured on new stamps By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Correos de Costa Rica will be honoring big cats on the verge of extinction with its new national parks stamp issue. The stamp will be unveiled today at the Parque Zoológico y Jardín Botánico Nacional Simón Bolívar in north San José. The two-stamp issue features a puma and a jaguar. The stamp issue is part of a series honoring Costa Rican national parks. The park involved in this series is the Parque Nacional Corcovado where many of the country's big cats are found. In fact, the park is home to five of the six cat species found in the country, noted Correos de Costa Rica. The special cancellation for the first-day covers features other cat species, Correos said. The postal service is issuing 15,000 of each stamp, and they sell for 1,220 and 690 colons. That is about $2.24 and $1.27. Tourism minister, Solís to meet on tax By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The tourism minster said Thursday that he has arranged a meeting with President Luis Guillermo Solís, Vice President Helio Fallas and representatives of the country's tax authority. The session will be next week, said the Instituto Costarricense de Turismo in a release. The statement said that the minster, Wilhelm von Breymann, met Thursday with Melvin Jiménez, minister of the Presidencia, to arrange the meeting. The topic, of course, is the effort by the Dirección General de Tributación, the tax agency, to assess sales tax and back taxes on a number of tourism operations. The tax authorities, who are in the ministry controlled by Falls, are relying on a 2006 law that says sale tax should be charged at centros de recreo, "recreation centers," y similares, "and similar." As far as the tax authorities are concerned, everything is similar. Tourism operators complained at a meeting Wednesday that just in the La Fortuna area businesses owe billions of colons in taxes and are likely to close if the law continues to be enforced. Ailing Tico returned from Honduras By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
A 72-year-old Costa Rican man spent 22 days in a Honduran hospital with severe illnesses, and at the request of his family, the Costa Rican Servicio de Vigilancia Aérea flew a craft to Tegucigalpa and retrieved him. The man is Justino Daniel Rodríguez Izquierdo, a professor. He suffered what appears to be a stroke, but he also came down with pneumonia. He had gone to Honduras for a conference on recycling, said the security ministry. The air wing of the security ministry does a lot of ambulance flights but not often outside the country. Former ambassador Todman dies By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Terence A. Todman, 88, once the U.S. ambassador to Costa Rica, has died and the foreign ministry here has expressed its condolences. Todman was ambassador here in 1974. He also served as an assistant secretary of State for Latin America. Under Jimmy Carter Todman helped reach an agreement with Panamá for turning over the canal. He died in the Virgin Islands where he was born.
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A.M. Costa Rica Third News Page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Aug. 22, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 166 | |
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The brick Antigua Aduana is 215 meters (705 feet) long and 17.5 meters (57 feet) wide. It will be filled with booths and displays of booksellers starting today. There also is a lengthy daily agenda available HERE! |
 A.M. Costa Rica/Michael Krumholtz
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| Officials extol social benefits of the written word at book
fair opening |
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By
Michael Krumholtz
of the A.M. Costa Rica staff On the eve of the international book fair, Costa Rican leaders sang the praises of the written word, saying reading is a tool that can directly dispel poverty and inequality. Before President Luis Guillermo Solís cut the ceremonial tape during the festival's inauguration Thursday at the Antigua Aduana, he said books are a vital resource for developing future thinkers and leaders. “A book is a very important instrument of change and one that preserves the human spirit,” Solís said. The president shared some statistics that he called discouraging, which show that 51 percent of Costa Ricans did not open a book in the past year. “These are extremely harsh numbers,” he said. “I believe that activities like this play a huge role in reaching out to not just authors, but a chain of people that can allow them to believe in books.” Solís stressed the need for greater access to literature among youth and elementary students and said a book's ability to enlighten the reader about a range of ideas, from one's own heritage to foreign societies and beliefs, give it an unparalleled power when compared to other media. He added that image-centric platforms like television and the Internet are becoming more and more popular among children but that schools need to teach effectively with books to |
allow students to
think critically and form varying perspectives. José Alfredo Chavarría, the acting minister of culture, stressed that the path towards eliminating poverty and corruption leads through the schools. “We have situated our ministry to promote and develop cultural learning within our schools, hoping that this will put our country's future in a better position,” he said. The 15th annual Fería Internacional del Libro officially begins today at the Antigua Aduana and continues until Aug. 31. As the festival's country of honor, the United States will be well represented among the invited authors in attendance. Around 100 activities for U.S. writers are planned, including presentations and book signings. New York-born Jenny Smith, an award-winning reporter and environmental writer, has been chosen as the fair's featured writer. Today's lineup features a book presentation on Costa Rican traditions by author Jack Donnelly, a conversation about U.S. postmodern literature, and a talk on the evolution of electronic books. A variety of stands selling national and international books, art, and other media will be set up everyday and musical performances will cap off each night of the fair. This year's edition of the festival is also dedicated to the memory of Alberto Cañas, the country's famed writer, journalist, and politician who died this March. Cañas supposedly had a lifelong goal of reading up to 100 books every year. |
| Jacó developer freed from Pérez Zeledón
jail after paying $1.5 million |
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By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Patrick Hundley, the owner of Daystar Properties in Jacó, left prison Wednesday after spending six months in preventative detention, according to his lawyer, José Manuel Echandí. Hundley was set free from his jail cell in Pérez Zeledón after posting $1.5 million in bail, Echandí said. Hundley was put in preventative detention Feb. 17 for investigation of allegations of fraud involving a deal with Jacó real estate owners. The lawyer added that Hundley was going through a medical examination Thursday to determine if he contracted any diseases from staying in the overcrowded prison containing lowly, unsanitary conditions that he described in a June letter. He said earlier that he was especially concerned about his client getting dengue because of |
how
prevalent mosquitos are in the prison. Hundley is involved in a separate civil case against the state as he claims the government wrongly imprisoned him for six months. Echandí said he's confident Hundley will win the case against Costa Rica since the Ministerio Público and prosecutors never actually presented accusations against the real estate developer. Echandí said he expected Hundley to return to Jacó by Monday. An area real estate company called Lost Beach surfaced in July with an email that said it would be taking over management of flagship Daystar properties at Diamante del Sol, Bahia Encantada, Bahia Azul, La Paloma Blanca and The Palms, claiming mismanagement on the part of Hundley and Daystar. Representatives at Daystar said the company has been running without problems in the absence of Hundley. |
| You need to see Costa Rican tourism information HERE! |
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| A.M. Costa Rica's Fourth News page | |||||
| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Aug. 22, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 166 | |||||
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| Conviction of notary is latest step in a series of property
fraud cases |
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By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
A complex series of property frauds has moved close to resolution with the conviction of a notary and the issuing of a prison sentence of 24 years. The case involves seven incidents of property fraud. For administrative reasons, three of the cases have not yet been brought to trial. The current cases involve four properties and a notary with the last names of Parini Segura. He was the man sentenced. In Costa Rican law notaries have great legal power. Prosecutors say that Parini grossly abused his power by blatantly forging documents that transfered real estate without the knowledge of the owners. The Poder Judicial said he used four techniques. In one case he simply wrote a fake document in his notary book involving a corporation held by a foreigner. The corporate books were in the control of the owner in another country, but the notary document was presented as if it was authentic. As a result another individual was able to transfer the property for 42 million colons, or about $77,000. The man who negotiated the fraudulent sale still is in flight, prosecutors said. |
In another case
involving a corporation, a new and fake slate of officers was named via
false documents. Despite the obvious nature of the frauds, investigators spent a lot of time obtaining information. The first case was said to have taken place in 2011. The last was in the early part of 2013, said the Poder Judicial. The arrest was made in early 2013. The trial took place in July and the early part of this month. But the case still is not over. Parini has been remanded to preventative detention while a higher court hears the case. There may even be appeals. A second notary admitted his role in an abbreviated process earlier this year. He received two and a half years in prison. Whether he actually will serve time is uncertain. Usually persons who receive a sentence of three years or less and have a clean record receive conditional discharge. A woman who also was involved in putting a mortgage on a property illegally has been ordered to repay the mortgage. The property involved went to auction when the woman did not pay the periodic charges on the mortgage, said the Poder Judicial. The property belongs to some of her family members, the Poder Judicial said. |
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A.M. Costa Rica's Fifth
news page
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| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Aug. 22, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 166 | |||||||
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| Modern humans have existed with Neanderthals, study says By the University of Oxford news
service
Neanderthals and modern humans were both living in Europe together for between 2,600 and 5,400 years, according to a new paper published in the journal, Nature. For the first time, scientists have constructed a robust timeline showing when the last Neanderthals died out. Significantly, the research paper says there is strong evidence to suggest that Neanderthals disappeared at different times across Europe rather than being rapidly replaced by modern humans. A team, led by Thomas Higham of the University of Oxford, obtained new radiocarbon dates for around 200 samples of bone, charcoal and shell from 40 key European archaeological sites. The sites, ranging from Russia in the east to Spain in the west, were either linked with the Neanderthal tool-making industry, known as Mousterian, or were transitional sites containing stone tools associated with either early modern humans or Neanderthals. The chronology was pieced together during a six-year research project by building mathematical models that combine the new radiocarbon dates with established archaeological stratigraphic evidence. The results showed that both groups overlapped for a significant period, giving ample time for interaction and interbreeding. The paper adds, however, it is not clear where interbreeding may have happened in Eurasia or whether it occurred once or several times. "Other recent studies of Neanderthal and modern human genetic make-up suggest that both groups interbred outside Africa, with 1.5 percent to 2.1 percent or more of the DNA of modern non-African human populations originating from Neanderthals," Higham said. "We believe we now have the first robust timeline that sheds new light on some of the key questions around the possible interactions between Neanderthals and modern humans. The chronology also pinpoints the timing of the Neanderthals’ disappearance, and suggests they may have survived in dwindling populations in pockets of Europe before they became extinct.’ In 2011, another Nature study featuring Katerina Douka of the Oxford team obtained some very early dates (around 45,000 years old) for the so-called transitional Uluzzian stone-tool industry of Italy and identified teeth remains in the site of the Grotta del Cavallo, Apulia, as those of anatomically modern humans. Under the new timeline published this week, the Mousterian industry (attributed to Neanderthals and found across vast areas of Europe and Eurasia) is shown to have ended between 41,030 to 39,260 years ago. This suggests strongly that there was an extensive overlapping period between Neanderthals and modern humans of several thousand years. The scientific team has for the first time specified exactly how long this overlap lasted, with 95 percent probability. The Uluzzian also contains objects, such as shell beads, that scholars widely believe signify symbolic or advanced behavior in early human groups. One or two of the Châtelperronian sites of France and northern Spain (currently, although controversially, associated with Neanderthals) contain some similar items. This supports the theory first advanced several years ago that the arrival of early modern humans in Europe may have stimulated the Neanderthals into copying aspects of their symbolic behavior in the millennia before they disappeared. The paper also presents an alternative theory: that the similar start dates of the two industries could mean that Châtelperronian sites are associated with modern humans and not Neanderthals after all. There is currently no evidence to show that Neanderthals and early modern humans lived closely together, regardless of whether the Neanderthals were responsible for the Châtelperronian culture, the paper says. Rather than modern humans rapidly replacing Neanderthals, there seems to have been a more complex picture characterized by a biological and cultural mosaic that lasted for several thousand years. The Châtelperronian industry follows the Mousterian in archaeological layers at all sites where both occur. Importantly, however, the Châtelperronian industry appears to have started significantly before the end of Mousterian at some sites in Europe. This suggests that if Neanderthals were responsible for both cultures, there may have been some regional variation in their tool-making, says the paper. Mobile systems vulnerable researching hackers report By the University of California,
Riverside
news service A team of researchers, including an assistant professor at the University of California, Riverside have identified a weakness believed to exist in Android, Windows and iOS mobile operating systems that could be used to obtain personal information from unsuspecting users. They demonstrated the hack in an Android phone. The researchers tested the method and found it was successful between 82 percent and 92 percent of the time on six of the seven popular apps they tested. Among the apps they easily hacked were Gmail, CHASE Bank and H&R Block. Amazon, with a 48 percent success rate, was the only app they tested that was difficult to penetrate. The paper was to be presented today at a security symposium in San Diego. Authors of the paper include Zhiyun Qian of the Riverside institution. The researchers believe their method will work on other operating systems because they share a key feature researchers exploited in the Android system. However, they haven’t tested the program using the other systems. The researchers said they started working on the method because they believed there was a security risk with so many apps being created by s many developers. Once a user downloads a bunch of apps to his or her smart phone they are all running on the same shared infrastructure or operating system. “The assumption has always been that these apps can’t interfere with each other easily,” Qian said. “We show that assumption is not correct and one app can, in fact, significantly impact another and result in harmful consequences for the user.” The attack works by getting a user to download a seemingly benign, but actually malicious, app, such as one for background wallpaper on a phone. Once that app is installed, the researchers are able to exploit a newly discovered public side channel, the shared memory statistics of a process, which can be accessed without any privileges. The researchers monitor changes in shared memory and are able to correlate changes to what they call an activity transition event, which includes such things as a user logging into Gmail or H&R Block or a user taking a picture of a check so it can be deposited online, without going to a physical CHASE Bank. Augmented with a few other side channels, the authors show that it is possible to fairly accurately track in real time which activity a victim app is in. “By design, Android allows apps to be preempted or hijacked,” Qian said. “But the thing is you have to do it at the right time so the user doesn’t notice. We do that and that’s what makes our attack unique.” Business leaders pushing for immigration changes By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
U.S. President Barack Obama’s proposed comprehensive immigration reform remains stalled in a politically divided Congress, but business leaders around the country say immigration reform is needed to keep the economy growing. The situation was the focus of a recent business forum in Houston. In recent years, thousands of the world’s best and brightest people have been denied H1-B visas that are issued to immigrants with special skills or education. Former governor of New Mexico and U.S. Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson says the system needs to change, “so that skilled workers, engineers, computer specialists that are here on student visas, can stay and create jobs in the American economy." The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other business organizations favor a large expansion of H1-B visas especially for talented people from around the world who study at U.S. universities on student visas, but cannot stay after they graduate. The ones who do stay are in high demand, according to Massey Villareal, president of Precision Task Group in Houston. “We spend over $30,000 a month just on recruiting costs, just trying to find these employees, so my clients are asking for highly qualified skill sets that I have a hard time finding, and then when I find them, my competitor offers them $10,000 a year more and they are gone," said Villareal. Last year, 172,000 petitions for H1-B visas were filed, but current law allows for only 85,000 each year. Attorney Charles Foster headed a task force on immigration for the Greater Houston Partnership. “It is a dysfunctional system; one day a year you can petition for the brightest people in the world, and then you have a 30 percent chance," he said. Many pro-reform business executives are Republicans, but Foster says the party’s immigration policy is controlled by the Tea Party movement. “Their anger, their opposition, is mostly based upon rumor and anecdotal stuff that has little to do with the truth. When you get before them and explain what real immigration reform means, they have a very different position," he said. Still, most conservatives remain opposed on principle to any reform that would provide what they see as amnesty for people who entered the country illegally. Republicans in Congress favor a bill that would increase the number of H1-B visas for skilled workers and leave the larger reform package for later. But Democrats reject that, saying it should be part of an overall reform that would open the door to citizenship to those living here illegally, and that stalemate, according to studies done by business groups, is costing the nation tens of thousands of jobs as well as a more competitive edge in the world economy. Two aid workers discharged after their ebola battles By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
U.S. aid workers Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol have been discharged from Emory University Hospital in Atlanta after recovering from ebola and testing clear of the virus, officials said Thursday. Ms. Writebol, 59, was released Tuesday, and her husband, David, said in a statement emailed by the aid group SIM that she is free of the virus but is in a weakened condition. She is recuperating at an undisclosed location. She had asked that her discharge remain private. Brantly, 33, who was flown to Atlanta Aug. 2, said “today is a miraculous day” at a news conference as he was released from Emory on Thursday. "I am forever thankful to God for sparing my life," he said. Bruce Ribner, medical director of Emory's Infectious Disease Unit, said both Brantly and Ms. Writebol were discharged after blood tests showed no evidence of the virus and eased symptoms. The two aid workers were treated for nearly three weeks at the Atlanta hospital. Ribner said they are both likely to make a complete recovery, adding, "The discharge from the hospital of both these patients poses no public health threat." Ribner said the two were released in consultation with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “To the extent that we've tested, there is no evidence of Ebola virus in their bodies,” Ribner said. He said the limited knowledge of the Ebola virus "especially in our country – has created understandable anxiety and fear for some persons." "We understand there are a lot of questions and concerns regarding ebola, but we cannot let our fears dictate our actions. We must all care," he said. Ribner said the two will have follow-up care, "much like anyone who has been in intensive care." When asked how much the hospital spent on the care for Brantly and Ms. Writebol, he answered, "I have no clue." The two were infected while working at a missionary clinic outside Liberia's capital. Emory Hospital is where Brantly and Ms. Writebol received treatment that included the experimental drug ZMapp. Ribner had said that these two were the very first to receive the treatment and doctors do not know whether it helped them, it had no effect or "theoretically delayed their recovery." Brantly, while in Liberia, also received a blood transfusion from a teenager who had survived ebola. When asked how this transfusion might have helped Brantly, Ribner said, "We have no idea how, if at all, that impacted his outcome." Liberia has been hardest hit by the worst-ever outbreak of the disease. The World Health Organization says 1,350 people have died in West Africa, with 576 of the deaths coming from Liberia. Fed policy on easy money might be tightened soon By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
No one knows when the U.S. Federal Reserve will begin again to raise the key interest rate that banks pay on overnight loans, but the central bank's July meeting minutes suggest it could be soon. Since 2008, the Fed's key interest rate has been near zero. Wednesday, the Fed released the minutes from last month's meeting, and they show a majority of Fed policy makers believe interest rates can rise because the U.S. economy is now strong enough. But when interest rates will start to go up is the big unknown. Wall Street hopes to learn more from Fed Chair Janet Yellen, who was scheduled to speak at an economic conference in Wyoming. Although Fed governors appear to say interest rates should rise, some conservative economists, including John Makin at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington-based research institute, argue that the Fed should keep interest rates low for a while longer. Makin said the 4 percent growth rate observed in the U.S. economy during the second quarter of this year could be short lived, and will be especially brief if the Fed is encouraged to raise rates. He pointed out that economic growth in the U.S. was less than 0.95 percent during the first quarter, below the 3 percent forecast by the Fed. According to Makin, “without more artificial stimulus from the Fed... stock prices may - appropriately - begin to fall." He said low interest rates have created a market bubble on Wall Street. Minutes from the July Fed meeting and the Bank of International Settlements annual report released in June suggest the low interest rates are failing to address some of the economic problems besetting the U.S. Several of the participants at the Fed meeting, according to the minutes, expressed concern that Americans are saving too much, and "that the slow rise in wages and income might be insufficient to support stronger consumer spending." The factors suggest the Fed's six years of easy money policy may not be the prescription needed. The meeting participants also said a recovery in housing activity remains slow. They noted that "although mortgage rates were still low and housing appeared to be relatively affordable, various factors were seen as restraining demand, including low expected income and high levels of student debt as well as difficulty in obtaining mortgage credit, particularly for younger, first-time homebuyers." Nevertheless, Makin argues for a continued easy money policy, at least until inflation moves above 2 percent. |
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| A.M. Costa Rica's sixth news page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Aug. 22, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 166 | |||||||||
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Older coral
species appear tougher
By the University of Texas at
Arlington news service
New research indicates older species of coral have more of what it takes to survive a warming and increasingly polluted climate, according to biologists from the University of Texas at Arlington and the University of Puerto Rico in Mayagüez. The researchers examined 140 samples of 14 species of Caribbean corals for a study published by the open-access journal PLOS ONE this week. Pollution, overfishing and climate change threaten the health of coral reefs. A new study suggests older species are better equipped to survive. Jorge H. Pinzón C., a postdoctoral researcher in the University of Texas at Arlington Department of Biology is lead author on the study. The team looked at the number of diseases affecting each species over the years and tested the species’ base-level immunity in the lab to determine whether a phylogenic signal existed. A phylogenetic signal is when organisms in closely related species have characteristics that are more similar to each other than they are to more distant species. Species that have been around over longer periods of time have been exposed to more environmental and biological stressors, and they have survived, so it seems logical to expect that they would have better base immunity or be better adapted to respond to new stresses, the team reasoned. Coral reefs around the world are vital to ocean diversity and health, as well as to millions of families and many industries such as fishing and tourism that benefit from the ecological services they provide. But, their health is threatened by pollution, overfishing and climate change. These stressors have weakened coral defenses and made some species more susceptible to diseases, such as white plague and yellow band diseases. Some of the oldest corals in the study, such as the Porites astreoides or “mustard hill coral,” have been around for more than 200 million years while others diverged to become a new species as recently as 7 million years ago. For the most part, older corals exhibited fewer diseases and better immunity. Researchers found, for example, that older corals can kill up to 41 percent of bacterial growth versus just 14.6 percent in newer species. Pinzón said that the pattern that emerged from the team’s work gives scientists a starting point to predict which corals could be more susceptible to disease. The paper pinpoints two factors – the inhibition of bacterial growth and melanin concentration – that were higher in older corals and likely play an important role in disease resistance. Newer species showed higher levels of antioxidants, although, such high levels in antioxidants could indicate newer corals are under a constant state of stress that might compromise their immune system and other biological functions. |
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| From Page 7 : Industrial chamber gets a new president By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Enrique J. Egloff has been named president of the Cámara de Industrias de Costa Rica. He is a former president of the Coalición Costarricense de Iniciativas de Desarrollo, the country's investment promotion agency. He also has worked at Firestone and Gallito Industrial and has served as adviser to the World Bank, Intel Corp. and Abbot, said the chamber. The chamber said that he plans to construct alliances and strongly promote the organization's work. He was quoted as saying that an industrial policy that improved competitivity in the country is required urgently. A new board of directors also was named. |
