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A panel of advisors to the Food and Drug Administration voted Wednesday to update the COVID-19 vaccine formula ahead of a planned fall immunization campaign, now an annual step to try to offer better protection against circulating versions of the virus.The unanimous vote of 16 advisers recommends a formula aimed at combating the JN.1 variant, which dominated infections in the United States in February, or a version of it. In recent weeks, JN.1 has been overtaken by descendants known as KP.2 and KP.3.In the coming weeks, the FDA is expected to formally recommend a target variant to vaccine makers for the next round of vaccinations in late summer or early fall. Any decision involves some educated guesswork, given that any new vaccine formula won't be available until months after a vari...

A professional skier and his girlfriend died when they fell more than 2,000 feet while climbing a mountain in the Italian Alps, the country's sports officials said.The death of the two, Jean Daniel Pession and Elisa Arlian, was denounced by FISI, the Italian winter sports federation, which defined the episode as an "accident" and a "terrible tragedy".Mr Pession and Ms Arlian, both Italian, on Saturday were climbing a ridge dividing the east and north faces of Monte Zerbion, a mountain in the Pennine Alps that they both knew well. As often happens on climbs of this type, they were tied together. They were alone, so it's not known exactly how or why they fell.When his family reported his disappearance, rescuers started searching. A helicopter equipped with equipment capable of det...

Electric cars are more expensive than petrol ones, mainly because the batteries cost a lot. But new technology could turn these expensive devices into an asset, offering owners benefits such as reduced utility bills, lower rents or free parking.Ford Motor, General Motors, BMW and other automakers are exploring how electric car batteries could be used to store excess renewable energy to help utilities manage fluctuations in energy supply and demand. Automakers would earn money by acting as intermediaries between car owners and energy suppliers.Millions of cars could be thought of as a huge energy system that, for the first time, will be connected to another huge energy system, the electric grid, said Matthias Preindl, associate professor of power electronic systems at Columbia University....

Wandering alone along the southern fringes of Saudi Arabia’s mountainous Asir Province, some eight miles from the Yemeni border, in a nondescript town with a prominent sculpture of a rifle balanced on an ornately painted plinth, I met a man, Nawab Khan, who was building a palace out of mud.Actually, he was rebuilding the structure, restoring it. And when I came across him, he hadn’t yet begun his work for the day; he was seated on the side of the road beneath its red-and-white windows — cross-legged, on a rug, leaning over a pot of tea and a bowl of dates.Two weeks earlier, on the far side of the country, a fellow traveler had pointed at a map and described the crumbling buildings here, in Dhahran al-Janub, arranged in a colorful open-air museum. Finding myself nearby, I’d detoured to have...

One of the nation's leading medical advisory organizations has weighed in on long-term Covid with a 265-page report that recognizes the severity and persistence of the condition for millions of Americans.More than four years into the coronavirus pandemic, long Covid continues to harm many people's ability to function, according to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, a nongovernmental institution that advises federal agencies on subject of science and medicine.“Long Covid can impact people across the lifespan, from children to older adults, as well as across sex, gender, racial, ethnic and other demographic groups,” he said, concluding that “the Long Covid is associated with a wide range of new or worsening health conditions and includes more than 200 sympt...

Amanda Knox, an American convicted and later cleared of killing her roommate while they studied in Italy, lost another trial in an Italian court on Wednesday against defamation charges linked to the 2007 murder.Ms. Knox was convicted by a Florence court on charges of defaming a man who ran a bar where she worked, falsely accusing him of killing her roommate, 21-year-old Meredith Kercher, in 2007. Ms. Knox was convicted by court to three years in prison, time he has already served.Ms Knox was initially found guilty of defaming the man, Diya Lumumba, also known as Patrick, in 2009, a conviction upheld by various Italian courts. At the time of the murder, Mr Lumumba ran a bar called Le Chic where Ms Knox worked part-time.Ms. Knox declined to speak to reporters after Wednesday's sentencin...

Israel organized and funded an influence campaign last year aimed at U.S. lawmakers and the American public with pro-Israel messages, as it aimed to foster support for its actions in the war with Gaza, according to officials involved in the initiative and related documents to the conflict. operation.The covert campaign was commissioned by Israel's Ministry of Diaspora Affairs, a government body that connects Jews around the world with the State of Israel, four Israeli officials said. According to officials and documents, the ministry allocated about $2 million for the operation and hired Stoic, a Tel Aviv political marketing firm, to carry it out.The campaign began in October and remains active on Platform X. At its peak, it used hundreds of fake accounts posing as real Americans on ...

The House voted mostly along party lines Tuesday to impose sweeping sanctions on International Criminal Court officials, rebuking efforts by the court's top prosecutor to charge top Israeli leaders with war crimes in connection with the offensive against Hamas.The bill would force President Biden to restrict entry to the United States, revoke visas and impose financial restrictions on anyone in court who is involved in attempting to investigate, arrest, detain or prosecute “protected persons” or allies of the United States . It would also target anyone providing “financial, material or technological support” to such efforts.Biden's advisers said he is "strongly opposed" to the measure because it would impose sanctions on such a broad group of officials, including court staff membe...

An independent advisory panel to the Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday rejected the use of MDMA-assisted therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder, highlighting the unprecedented regulatory challenges of a new therapy using the drug commonly known as Ecstasy.Before the vote, committee members expressed concerns about the design of the two studies submitted by the drug's sponsor, Lykos Therapeutics. Many questions focused on whether study participants were generally able to correctly guess whether they had taken MDMA, also known as Ecstasy or Molly. The jury voted 9-2 on the effectiveness of MDMA-assisted therapy and 10-1 on whether the benefits of the proposed treatment outweighed the risks.Other speakers expressed concerns about the drug's potential cardiovascular effects...

The two contenders to become Britain's next prime minister clashed furiously over taxes, immigration and health policy Tuesday in a televised debate that at times descended into bad-tempered exchanges as the political rivals argued with each other.The clash came exactly a month before the crucial general election that will determine whether the opposition Labor Party can capitalize on its strong lead in opinion polls and end 14 turbulent years of Conservative-led government during which the party has had five different prime ministers.Soon after the debate began, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said that his opponent, Labor leader Keir Starmer, would raise taxes on British citizens by £2,000 a year if he won the election, repeating the same claim numerous times. “Absolute rubbish,” Starmer...