Today's Top 5 Headlines:
1. French Yacht Crew Winched to Safety (Scoop News)
2. "I've Got Four Kidneys, Want one?"(Sydney Morning Herald)
3. Great News! Stolen Medals Recovered! (New Zealand) (Scoop News)
4. Self-made Millionaire Donates a Fortune to Help Students (The Oregonian)
5. 8-Limbed Girl Recovers, Takes First Steps (ABC News)
Honorable Mention:
Cheers! World's fattest man drops 230kg (news.com.au)
1. French yacht crew winched to safety
Monday, 18 February 2008, 4:33 pmPress Release: Maritime New Zealand
Ten sailors whose yacht overturned 80 nautical miles (145km) east of Dunedin today have been winched to safety by three rescue helicopters and are en route to Dunedin.
Rescue Coordination Centre New Zealand (RCCNZ) facilitated the rescue response after its equivalent in France called at 1.20pm (NZDT) to report it had picked up a signal from the vessel’s 406Mhz Emergency Position indicating Radio Beacon (EPIRB).
RCCNZ was able to speak to the crew via satellite phone and confirm that all on board the French Trimaran Group ama III are uninjured. All were dressed in survival gear when they were picked up from the yacht’s hull.
The yacht was taking part in the Jules Verne Round the World Yacht Race when it overturned.
Weather in the area consists of 2m swells and south-westerly winds of 30 knots.
2. "I've got four kidneys, want one?"
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2008/02/18/1203190689053.html
Jonathan DartFebruary 18, 2008 - 7:59AM
An 18-year-old girl in England who found out she has four kidneys is going to donate her extra organs to a cancer sufferer.
Laura Moon went to have an ultrasound at the Seacroft Hospital in her home town of Leeds, after complaining about pains in her stomach.
The doctors were so astonished by what they found, they took photos to show to their university students. Ms Moon's scan revealed four kidneys, two measuring 14 centimetres and two measuring nine centimetres.
She is now thinking about giving away the surplus organs.
The Daily Mail reported that Ms Moon was moved by the story of Luke Heppenstall, a three-year-old cancer sufferer, who urgently needs a new kidney.
"I'm not exactly sure how donations work but I know that I have four kidneys and would like to help somebody like Luke if possible," she told the paper.
"I think if I've got four, I don't need all four. Why not donate if there's someone else in need?"
Leeds Teaching Hospital transplant expert Niaz Ahmad said parts of the kidney system were sometimes duplicated but he had never seen anyone with four full kidney systems.
"To have completely duplex kidneys on both sides is extremely rare," he told the paper.
3. Great News! Stolen Medals Recovered! (New Zealand)
PM praises police efforts
Monday, 18 February 2008, 8:51 amPress Release: New Zealand Government 16 February 2008
Prime Minister Helen Clark today praised the New Zealand Police for their work in ensuring the safe return of the 96 medals stolen from the Waiouru Army Museum last year.
Helen Clark said the medals were an invaluable part of New Zealand’s heritage and their theft had appalled the nation.
“The police work on this operation has been painstaking and thorough. They have now got the results hoped for New Zealand, and I commend them. Today is a proud day for the New Zealand Police,” Helen Clark said.
4. Self-made millionaire donates a fortune to help students
The Monday Profile: Harold Wyatt
Monday, February 18, 2008
Michelle Trappin The Oregonian Staff
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1203303313110090.xml&coll=7&thispage=1
FOREST GROVE -- If $1 million could repair the nerve damage in his legs, Harold Wyatt says, he would spend it. To run, fish, hunt again. But doctors have told the 94-year-old that money can't fix him. So, instead, the Forest Grove man, who made millions processing frozen Flavorland strawberries, gives his money to help high school students.
Since 1993, the Harold Alfred Wyatt Scholarship Fund has provided more than 185 scholarships to students in rugged Baker County, where he grew up, and to agriculture-drawn students in western Washington County. Most recently, Wyatt donated $1 million to Forest Grove High School for need-based college scholarships. When he dies, he will bequeath the school another $1 million.
"It makes me feel good," says the slender 6-foot-2-inch man, sounding much like the late actor Jimmy Stewart.
It also reminds Wyatt of a life well lived. Of goals set and completed, children born and raised, adventures planned and taken. Sharing what he's reaped completes his personal circle and launches young minds -- he hopes -- on equally meaningful journeys.
John O'Neill, principal at Forest Grove High School, says January's $1 million donation was the largest to his school. Annually, interest from the donation will provide about $45,000 in scholarships.
"A good high school should open doors," O'Neill says. "This donation definitely will help open those doors."
(This article has 3 subsequent pages about Wyatt’s life. For more information, please visit the website noted at the beginning of this article)
5. 8-Limbed Girl Recovers, Takes First Steps
By KAREN RUSSOMUMBAI, India, Feb. 18, 2008 http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=4305864&page=1
Just three months after marathon surgery successfully removed her four extra arms and legs, little Lakshmi Tatma has taken her first steps.
"She's now moving with a walker, holding onto objects — a table, a chair — and moving a little bit," said Sharan Patil, chief orthopedic surgeon and chairman of Sparsh Hospital in Bangalore where the surgery was performed.
The 2-year-old Indian girl captured international attention in November when a team of 30 surgeons separated what was essentially a headless parasitic twin joined at her pelvis. Parasitic twins differ from conjoined twins because they are not fully formed and they depend upon the body functions of the complete fetus.
"Lakshmi always knew she was different. After the operation she instinctively started behaving like a normal child. It's like she had always been waiting for the opportunity," the girl's mother, Poonam Tatma, told Britain's Channel 4 News.
"When she was put in the baby walker she started pushing herself backwards with her legs and burst into laughter with a huge grin on her face. She loves it."
The girl's swift progress comes as no surprise to Patil.
"She has very good control of her muscles and limbs — except that she has club feet — and there's no reason to think she will not walk. She's an intelligent kid, so she's definitely making progress."
During the surgery, Lakshmi's spine was cut to remove the extra limbs and the wide gap between the pelvic bones was closed using bone grafts.
Lakshmi comes from a remote village in Bihar, the poorest state in India, where her father, Shambhu, and mother had tried unsuccessfully to find medical help for her. They were told surgery was not possible.
The family struggled financially, particularly because only one parent could work while the other cared for Lakshmi who was constantly running a fever. Survival rates for conjoined twins can be as low as 5 percent. Doctors believed that Lakshmi would likely die in her teens without surgery.
In their village, which has just 150 homes and no electricity, Lakshmi's parents tried to give her in as normal a life as possible. But in the region, villagers considered her to be the reincarnation of the multilimbed goddess of wealth, Laxmi. And some people had even tried to buy Lakshmi to put her in the circus.
In late September, Patil traveled to the family's village after receiving a call from a social worker seeking help for Lakshmi's condition. Sparsh Hospital, which was created to help the middle and lower classes of India to receive quality care, donated the cost of the surgery, estimated at $625,000.
Lakshmi will return to Sparsh at the end of March for follow-up for surgery on her club feet and her spinal cord.
Patil, who said he is still "on a high" from the success of the surgery, said that she will likely be walking on her own soon.
"I don't think it will be more than a few weeks," he said.
Honorable Mention:
Cheers! World's fattest man drops 230kg
From correspondents in Mexico City
February 13, 2008 02:21pm
THE world's fattest man, according to the Guinness Book of Records, today proudly announced he has lost 230kg (507.0632026 lbs)- nearly half his original weight - in less time than doctors had expected.
"I'm going to throw a big party," Manuel Uribe said.
"I'm getting out of my house and going for a walk" in Monterrey, where he lives in northern Mexico.
Mr Uribe, 42, weighed in at 570kg (1256.6348934 lbs) at his heaviest and for five years has been bed-ridden at his home, where his mother and fiancee help him.
Doctors from neighbouring United States, Italy and Mexico for two years have been helping Mr Uribe lose weight through dieting and exercise.
His goal, he said, is dropping to a slim 120kg in four more years.
On March 9, Uribe will be lifted out of his house on his bed by a special crane and driven around on a flat-bed truck.
"I feel great," he said. "The doctors say I'm healthier than ever."
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