Hingis retires, says she tested positive for cocaine
Zurich, Switzerland (Sports Network) - Former World No. 1 Martina Hingis announced on Thursday that she tested positive for cocaine during this year's Wimbledon Championships and also announced her retirement from professional tennis.
Hingis denied the allegations in a statement Thursday saying, "I find this accusation so horrendous, so monstrous, that I have decided to confront it head-on by talking to the press."
"I am frustrated and angry. I believe that I am absolutely, one hundred percent innocent."
Despite her protests, Hingis said she doesn't want to fight officials or try to battle back from injuries, and instead will call it a career.
"Considering this situation, my age, and the problems I have been having with my hip, I have decided to no longer play tennis on the Tour."
Amid the controversy, WTA CEO Larry Scott released the following statement:
"The Sony Ericsson WTA Tour has not received any official information regarding the positive doping test result referred to by Martina Hingis in her press conference today, and as a result we are not in a position to comment on the matter.
"However, it is important to remember that in the area of anti-doping, all players are presumed innocent until proven otherwise. The Sony Ericsson WTA Tour has a zero tolerance policy when it comes to doping in sport, and fully supports the Tennis Anti-Doping Program. The Tennis Anti-Doping program is both rigorous and comprehensive, and is designed to keep our sport clean.
"With respect to her retirement announcement, Martina Hingis is a tremendous champion and a fan favorite the world over. In her most recent comeback, she proved again that she can perform at the very highest levels of the game. Martina will always be respected for not only having achieved the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour World Number 1 ranking, her five Grand Slam singles titles, nine Grand Slam women's doubles titles and two Sony Ericsson Championships titles, but just as much for her incredible touch, on-court intelligence and off-court professionalism."
Hingis, 27, has not played since being bounced in the second round by Shuai Peng in Beijing at the end of September. She announced at the time that she was going to take as much time as needed to recover from hip problems.
This is the second time that Hingis has retired. She stepped aside for the first time in 2002 due to injuries to her feet, left knee and left hip, but returned in 2006.
The "Swiss Miss" had a 24-13 record this season, and is currently ranked 19th in the world. After her return in 2006, Hingis won three tournaments, including one this season, to increase her career total to 43.
Her best finish in the Grand Slams this season was a quarterfinal berth at the Australian Open. She did not play at the French Open and only advanced to the third round in both Wimbledon and the U.S. Open.
She won five career Grand Slam titles, capturing the Australian three straight years starting in 1997, when she also won her only Wimbledon and U.S. Open titles. She never won the French, advancing as far as the final twice.
Hingis first reached the world's top ranking March 31, 1997. She ended that year at the same position. The next year she ended the season ranked No. 2 before finishing the next two seasons as the top-ranked player in the world.
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
November 13, 2007
Italy Moves to Tighten Soccer Security and Control Fans After Riots
By ELISABETTA POVOLEDO
ROME, Nov. 12 — The Italian authorities moved Monday to ban large groups of soccer fans from traveling to out-of-town matches and imposed stricter security measures in stadiums, in response to rioting that took place in several cities on Sunday after the accidental police shooting of a soccer fan.
In another sign that Italy had had enough of the fan violence that often mars matches, the Italian soccer federation also said Monday that next weekend’s matches in Serie B and C — Italy’s second- and third-tier professional leagues — would be postponed and played at a later date. No matches were to be played this weekend in Serie A, Italy’s premier league, because of a previously scheduled break for international play.
The move to restrict traveling fans fell far short of a general ban. Under the measure passed Monday, supporters of clubs will still be able to attend out-of-town matches; they will be prohibited only from traveling to those matches in large groups.
The new security measures would also give local police chiefs the right to suspend a match if matters appeared to be getting out of control. The authorities also ordered clubs to deploy extra match stewards to monitor crowds in stadiums that hold more than 7,500 people. The stewards must be in place by March 1.
The decisions by the Interior Ministry and the country’s top soccer officials were made after widespread demands for tougher action following “yet another Black Sunday,” as the Rome daily Corriere dello Sport described the weekend riots.
The worst violence on Sunday took place in Rome where hundreds of enraged soccer fans responded to the police shooting by attacking police barracks as well as the headquarters of the Italian Olympic Committee, which is next to the city’s soccer stadium, causing nearly $150,000 of damage. About 40 police officers were injured during the clashes, the news agency ANSA reported.
Gabriele Sandri, a 26-year-old Roman D.J., was killed Sunday morning after a stray bullet hit him in the neck as he was sitting in a car on the highway that leads from Rome to Milan. Mr. Sandri, a supporter of Lazio, one of the capital’s two teams, was on his way to watch Lazio play Internazionale.
According to news reports, a police officer had fired his gun in an attempt to halt a scuffle between soccer fans at a highway rest stop, and hit Mr. Sandri. On Monday, the officer was charged with manslaughter. The authorities on Sunday called the death “a tragic error.”
Italy’s police chief, Antonio Manganelli, said in an interview with the state broadcaster RAI on Monday night that it was unlikely that the officer who shot Mr. Sandri knew that the scuffle he was trying to halt was between opposing soccer team supporters.
Italy has a history of soccer-related violence punctuated by explosions of widespread rioting, usually set off by random incidents like the shooting on Sunday morning. In February, riots broke out throughout Italy after rampaging fans killed a police officer outside a match in Catania, prompting the government to pass a series of stricter security measures for stadiums.
In response to that outbreak of violence, all Serie A matches were postponed for one week.
The soccer authorities suspended three Serie A matches on Sunday as well as one in Serie B. Many fans were angered that only three Serie A matches were postponed in response to the killing of a fan by a police officer, while in February the entire Serie A slate was postponed in response to the killing of a police officer by a fan.
The violence in Rome and other cities “is pure madness,” Roberto Donadoni, coach of the Italian national team, told ANSA. “It’s one of those moments where you just feel nauseous.”
On Monday, prosecutors in Rome said they would be charging four people arrested during the riots in the city with participating in terrorist activities, reportedly the first time such a charge has been levied against soccer rioters.
Italy Moves to Tighten Soccer Security and Control Fans After Riots
By ELISABETTA POVOLEDO
ROME, Nov. 12 — The Italian authorities moved Monday to ban large groups of soccer fans from traveling to out-of-town matches and imposed stricter security measures in stadiums, in response to rioting that took place in several cities on Sunday after the accidental police shooting of a soccer fan.
In another sign that Italy had had enough of the fan violence that often mars matches, the Italian soccer federation also said Monday that next weekend’s matches in Serie B and C — Italy’s second- and third-tier professional leagues — would be postponed and played at a later date. No matches were to be played this weekend in Serie A, Italy’s premier league, because of a previously scheduled break for international play.
The move to restrict traveling fans fell far short of a general ban. Under the measure passed Monday, supporters of clubs will still be able to attend out-of-town matches; they will be prohibited only from traveling to those matches in large groups.
The new security measures would also give local police chiefs the right to suspend a match if matters appeared to be getting out of control. The authorities also ordered clubs to deploy extra match stewards to monitor crowds in stadiums that hold more than 7,500 people. The stewards must be in place by March 1.
The decisions by the Interior Ministry and the country’s top soccer officials were made after widespread demands for tougher action following “yet another Black Sunday,” as the Rome daily Corriere dello Sport described the weekend riots.
The worst violence on Sunday took place in Rome where hundreds of enraged soccer fans responded to the police shooting by attacking police barracks as well as the headquarters of the Italian Olympic Committee, which is next to the city’s soccer stadium, causing nearly $150,000 of damage. About 40 police officers were injured during the clashes, the news agency ANSA reported.
Gabriele Sandri, a 26-year-old Roman D.J., was killed Sunday morning after a stray bullet hit him in the neck as he was sitting in a car on the highway that leads from Rome to Milan. Mr. Sandri, a supporter of Lazio, one of the capital’s two teams, was on his way to watch Lazio play Internazionale.
According to news reports, a police officer had fired his gun in an attempt to halt a scuffle between soccer fans at a highway rest stop, and hit Mr. Sandri. On Monday, the officer was charged with manslaughter. The authorities on Sunday called the death “a tragic error.”
Italy’s police chief, Antonio Manganelli, said in an interview with the state broadcaster RAI on Monday night that it was unlikely that the officer who shot Mr. Sandri knew that the scuffle he was trying to halt was between opposing soccer team supporters.
Italy has a history of soccer-related violence punctuated by explosions of widespread rioting, usually set off by random incidents like the shooting on Sunday morning. In February, riots broke out throughout Italy after rampaging fans killed a police officer outside a match in Catania, prompting the government to pass a series of stricter security measures for stadiums.
In response to that outbreak of violence, all Serie A matches were postponed for one week.
The soccer authorities suspended three Serie A matches on Sunday as well as one in Serie B. Many fans were angered that only three Serie A matches were postponed in response to the killing of a fan by a police officer, while in February the entire Serie A slate was postponed in response to the killing of a police officer by a fan.
The violence in Rome and other cities “is pure madness,” Roberto Donadoni, coach of the Italian national team, told ANSA. “It’s one of those moments where you just feel nauseous.”
On Monday, prosecutors in Rome said they would be charging four people arrested during the riots in the city with participating in terrorist activities, reportedly the first time such a charge has been levied against soccer rioters.
November 14, 2007
Study Compares States’ Math and Science Scores With Other Countries’
By SAM DILLON
American students even in low-performing states like Alabama do better on math and science tests than students in most foreign countries, including Italy and Norway, according to a new study released yesterday. That’s the good news.
The bad news is that students in Singapore and several other Asian countries significantly outperform American students, even those in high-achieving states like Massachusetts, the study found.
“In this case, the bad news trumps the good because our Asian economic competitors are winning the race to prepare students in math and science,” said the study’s author, Gary W. Phillips, chief scientist at the American Institutes of Research, a nonprofit independent scientific research firm.
The study equated standardized test scores of eighth-grade students in each of the 50 states with those of their peers in 45 countries. Experts said it was the first such effort to link standardized test scores, state by state, with scores from other nations.
Gage Kingsbury, a director at the Northwest Evaluation Association, a group in Oregon that carries out testing in 1,500 school districts, praised the study’s methodology but said “a flock of difficulties” made it hazardous to compare test results from one country to another and from one state to another. “Kids don’t start school at the same age in different countries,” he said. “Not all kids are in school in grade eight, and the percentage differs from country to country.”
Because of such differences, Dr. Kingsbury said, it would be a mistake to infer too much about the relative rigor of the educational systems across the states and nations in the study based merely on test score differences.
The scores for students in the United States came from tests administered by the federal Department of Education in most states in 2005 and 2007. For foreign students, the scores came from math and science tests administered worldwide in 2003, as part of the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study, known as the Timss.
Concern that science and math achievement was not keeping pace with the nation’s economic competitors had been building even before the most recent Timss survey, in which the highest-performing nations were Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong and Japan. American students lagged far behind those nations, but earned scores that were comparable to peers in European nations like Slovakia and Estonia, and were well above countries like Egypt, Chile and Saudi Arabia.
The Timss survey gives each country a metric by which to compare its educational attainment with other nations’. The nationwide American test, known as the National Assessments of Educational Progress, allows policy makers in each state to compare their students’ results with those in other states.
The new study used statistical linking to compare scores on the national assessment, state by state, with other nations’ scores on the Timss. Dr. Phillips, who from 1999 to 2002 led the agency of the Department of Education that administers the national assessment, likened the methodology to what economists do when they convert international currencies into dollars to compare poverty levels across various countries, for instance.
On the most recent national assessment, the highest-performing state in math was Massachusetts, and in science, North Dakota. The new study shows that average math achievement in Massachusetts was lower than in the leading Asian nations and in Belgium, but higher than in 40 other countries, including Australia, Russia, England and Israel.
Mississippi was the lowest-performing state in both math and science. In math, Mississippi students’ achievement was comparable to those of peers in Bulgaria and Moldova, and in science, to those in Norway and Romania.
In math, New Jersey, Connecticut and New York students were roughly equivalent with each other and with their peers in Australia, the Netherlands and Hungary.
The study’s contribution is the high-level perspective it offers on the nation’s education system, a bit the way a satellite image highlights the nation’s topography, said Thomas Toch, a co-director of Education Sector, an independent policy group.
“It shows we’re not doing as badly as some say,” Mr. Toch said. “We’re in the top half of the table, and a number of states are outperforming the majority of the nations in the study. But our performance in math and science lags behind that of the front-running Asian nations.”
Study Compares States’ Math and Science Scores With Other Countries’
By SAM DILLON
American students even in low-performing states like Alabama do better on math and science tests than students in most foreign countries, including Italy and Norway, according to a new study released yesterday. That’s the good news.
The bad news is that students in Singapore and several other Asian countries significantly outperform American students, even those in high-achieving states like Massachusetts, the study found.
“In this case, the bad news trumps the good because our Asian economic competitors are winning the race to prepare students in math and science,” said the study’s author, Gary W. Phillips, chief scientist at the American Institutes of Research, a nonprofit independent scientific research firm.
The study equated standardized test scores of eighth-grade students in each of the 50 states with those of their peers in 45 countries. Experts said it was the first such effort to link standardized test scores, state by state, with scores from other nations.
Gage Kingsbury, a director at the Northwest Evaluation Association, a group in Oregon that carries out testing in 1,500 school districts, praised the study’s methodology but said “a flock of difficulties” made it hazardous to compare test results from one country to another and from one state to another. “Kids don’t start school at the same age in different countries,” he said. “Not all kids are in school in grade eight, and the percentage differs from country to country.”
Because of such differences, Dr. Kingsbury said, it would be a mistake to infer too much about the relative rigor of the educational systems across the states and nations in the study based merely on test score differences.
The scores for students in the United States came from tests administered by the federal Department of Education in most states in 2005 and 2007. For foreign students, the scores came from math and science tests administered worldwide in 2003, as part of the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study, known as the Timss.
Concern that science and math achievement was not keeping pace with the nation’s economic competitors had been building even before the most recent Timss survey, in which the highest-performing nations were Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong and Japan. American students lagged far behind those nations, but earned scores that were comparable to peers in European nations like Slovakia and Estonia, and were well above countries like Egypt, Chile and Saudi Arabia.
The Timss survey gives each country a metric by which to compare its educational attainment with other nations’. The nationwide American test, known as the National Assessments of Educational Progress, allows policy makers in each state to compare their students’ results with those in other states.
The new study used statistical linking to compare scores on the national assessment, state by state, with other nations’ scores on the Timss. Dr. Phillips, who from 1999 to 2002 led the agency of the Department of Education that administers the national assessment, likened the methodology to what economists do when they convert international currencies into dollars to compare poverty levels across various countries, for instance.
On the most recent national assessment, the highest-performing state in math was Massachusetts, and in science, North Dakota. The new study shows that average math achievement in Massachusetts was lower than in the leading Asian nations and in Belgium, but higher than in 40 other countries, including Australia, Russia, England and Israel.
Mississippi was the lowest-performing state in both math and science. In math, Mississippi students’ achievement was comparable to those of peers in Bulgaria and Moldova, and in science, to those in Norway and Romania.
In math, New Jersey, Connecticut and New York students were roughly equivalent with each other and with their peers in Australia, the Netherlands and Hungary.
The study’s contribution is the high-level perspective it offers on the nation’s education system, a bit the way a satellite image highlights the nation’s topography, said Thomas Toch, a co-director of Education Sector, an independent policy group.
“It shows we’re not doing as badly as some say,” Mr. Toch said. “We’re in the top half of the table, and a number of states are outperforming the majority of the nations in the study. But our performance in math and science lags behind that of the front-running Asian nations.”
November 14, 2007
Four Transplant Recipients Contract H.I.V.
By DENISE GRADY
Four transplant recipients in Chicago have contracted H.I.V. from an organ donor, the first known cases in more than a decade in which the virus was spread by organ transplants.
The organs also gave all four patients hepatitis C, in what health officials said was the first reported instance in which the two viruses were spread simultaneously by a transplant.
Though exceedingly rare, this type of transmission highlights a known weakness in the system for checking organ donors for infection: the most commonly used tests can fail to detect viral diseases if they are performed too early in the course of the infection. Officials say the events in Chicago may lead to widespread changes in testing methods.
“There are important policy implications,” said Dr. Matthew Kuehnert, director of the Office of Blood, Organ and Other Tissue Safety at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which is investigating the case. “Clearly, the organ transplant community is going to think about the issues raised by this, and we look forward to being involved in those discussions.”
The cases were first reported yesterday by The Chicago Tribune. Two patients were infected at the University of Chicago Medical Center, and one each at Rush University Medical Center and Northwestern Memorial Hospital. The transplants were coordinated by an organization called the Gift of Hope of Elmhurst, Ill.
Officials would not say what organs were transplanted, but a transplant expert not connected with the case said they were most likely the kidneys, liver and either the heart or lungs. Only four organs, and no other tissue, were taken from the donor.
The University of Chicago said that the operations took place in January, and that the donor was an adult who died in an Illinois hospital “three days after traumatic injury.” Neither the donor’s age nor sex were disclosed. The other hospitals declined to discuss what happened, except to confirm that each had an infected patient.
The situation came to light earlier this month when one of the recipients, who was being evaluated for a retransplant, tested positive for H.I.V. and hepatitis C. At that point, blood preserved from the donor was given a highly sensitive test for viruses, and the infection was found.
Dr. J. Michael Millis, the chief of transplantation at the University of Chicago, said the patients were devastated, and the doctors heartbroken. But Dr. Millis said the diseases were treatable.
Initially, the donor had tested negative for H.I.V. and hepatitis C, apparently because the infection was too recent to be detected by commonly used blood tests. Those tests do not find the virus itself, but instead look for the body’s reaction to the infection — the antibodies produced by the immune system. But the body takes time to react, and if the test is done too soon, within 22 days of H.I.V. infection or 82 days for hepatitis C, antibodies may not yet be detectable.
Doctors say that is what probably occurred in Chicago. It has always been known that this kind of transmission was theoretically possible, but it was considered highly unlikely. And indeed, since 1994 nearly 300,000 transplants from cadavers have occurred without any reported cases of H.I.V. transmission.
Another more sensitive type of test can pick up viral infections earlier, but was not used. That test looks for evidence of the virus itself, and can reduce the “window,” the early period in which the test does not work, to 12 days for H.I.V. and 25 days for hepatitis C.
That test, the nucleic acid amplification test, or Naat, is not widely available, and doctors said it was more difficult and time-consuming than other tests — and there is usually no time to spare with transplants because organs deteriorate quickly when the donor dies. Another concern is that the test is more likely than others to give false-positive results, and lead to the needless destruction of healthy organs, a scarce resource.
Dr. Robert Brown, director of the liver transplant program at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia said, “There is always a drive toward better testing, but if it leads to more organ wastage, we’ll probably hurt more people than we help.”
According to the University of Chicago, the organ donor in Illinois was known to be “high risk,” based on a risk factor revealed by a close friend who provided “a health and social history.” The exact nature of the risk was not disclosed. Federal guidelines recommend against transplanting organs from high-risk people unless the recipients are so likely to die for want of a transplant that H.I.V. seems a lesser threat.
Dr. Millis said that he did not know whether the patients there had been informed of the donor’s status.
About 9 percent of organ donors qualify as high-risk based on behaviors like prostitution or drug use with needle-sharing. Transplant experts say the percentage would probably be higher if they had full information on all donors.
Dr. Brown said Columbia got offers of organs from high-risk donors every week.
He also said that at Columbia, patients (or family members) were informed if a donor was high risk, and were required to sign a special consent form acknowledging it.
Dr. Millis said that although the organ supply was generally safe, he hoped it could be made safer, probably by developing regional centers around the country to perform Naat testing reliably and quickly enough to meet transplant needs.
Although it is rare, other diseases like rabies, West Nile fever and a rodent virus called LCMV have also been spread by organ transplants. In all of those cases, patients died.
Four Transplant Recipients Contract H.I.V.
By DENISE GRADY
Four transplant recipients in Chicago have contracted H.I.V. from an organ donor, the first known cases in more than a decade in which the virus was spread by organ transplants.
The organs also gave all four patients hepatitis C, in what health officials said was the first reported instance in which the two viruses were spread simultaneously by a transplant.
Though exceedingly rare, this type of transmission highlights a known weakness in the system for checking organ donors for infection: the most commonly used tests can fail to detect viral diseases if they are performed too early in the course of the infection. Officials say the events in Chicago may lead to widespread changes in testing methods.
“There are important policy implications,” said Dr. Matthew Kuehnert, director of the Office of Blood, Organ and Other Tissue Safety at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which is investigating the case. “Clearly, the organ transplant community is going to think about the issues raised by this, and we look forward to being involved in those discussions.”
The cases were first reported yesterday by The Chicago Tribune. Two patients were infected at the University of Chicago Medical Center, and one each at Rush University Medical Center and Northwestern Memorial Hospital. The transplants were coordinated by an organization called the Gift of Hope of Elmhurst, Ill.
Officials would not say what organs were transplanted, but a transplant expert not connected with the case said they were most likely the kidneys, liver and either the heart or lungs. Only four organs, and no other tissue, were taken from the donor.
The University of Chicago said that the operations took place in January, and that the donor was an adult who died in an Illinois hospital “three days after traumatic injury.” Neither the donor’s age nor sex were disclosed. The other hospitals declined to discuss what happened, except to confirm that each had an infected patient.
The situation came to light earlier this month when one of the recipients, who was being evaluated for a retransplant, tested positive for H.I.V. and hepatitis C. At that point, blood preserved from the donor was given a highly sensitive test for viruses, and the infection was found.
Dr. J. Michael Millis, the chief of transplantation at the University of Chicago, said the patients were devastated, and the doctors heartbroken. But Dr. Millis said the diseases were treatable.
Initially, the donor had tested negative for H.I.V. and hepatitis C, apparently because the infection was too recent to be detected by commonly used blood tests. Those tests do not find the virus itself, but instead look for the body’s reaction to the infection — the antibodies produced by the immune system. But the body takes time to react, and if the test is done too soon, within 22 days of H.I.V. infection or 82 days for hepatitis C, antibodies may not yet be detectable.
Doctors say that is what probably occurred in Chicago. It has always been known that this kind of transmission was theoretically possible, but it was considered highly unlikely. And indeed, since 1994 nearly 300,000 transplants from cadavers have occurred without any reported cases of H.I.V. transmission.
Another more sensitive type of test can pick up viral infections earlier, but was not used. That test looks for evidence of the virus itself, and can reduce the “window,” the early period in which the test does not work, to 12 days for H.I.V. and 25 days for hepatitis C.
That test, the nucleic acid amplification test, or Naat, is not widely available, and doctors said it was more difficult and time-consuming than other tests — and there is usually no time to spare with transplants because organs deteriorate quickly when the donor dies. Another concern is that the test is more likely than others to give false-positive results, and lead to the needless destruction of healthy organs, a scarce resource.
Dr. Robert Brown, director of the liver transplant program at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia said, “There is always a drive toward better testing, but if it leads to more organ wastage, we’ll probably hurt more people than we help.”
According to the University of Chicago, the organ donor in Illinois was known to be “high risk,” based on a risk factor revealed by a close friend who provided “a health and social history.” The exact nature of the risk was not disclosed. Federal guidelines recommend against transplanting organs from high-risk people unless the recipients are so likely to die for want of a transplant that H.I.V. seems a lesser threat.
Dr. Millis said that he did not know whether the patients there had been informed of the donor’s status.
About 9 percent of organ donors qualify as high-risk based on behaviors like prostitution or drug use with needle-sharing. Transplant experts say the percentage would probably be higher if they had full information on all donors.
Dr. Brown said Columbia got offers of organs from high-risk donors every week.
He also said that at Columbia, patients (or family members) were informed if a donor was high risk, and were required to sign a special consent form acknowledging it.
Dr. Millis said that although the organ supply was generally safe, he hoped it could be made safer, probably by developing regional centers around the country to perform Naat testing reliably and quickly enough to meet transplant needs.
Although it is rare, other diseases like rabies, West Nile fever and a rodent virus called LCMV have also been spread by organ transplants. In all of those cases, patients died.
Thursday, November 01, 2007
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