Peanut Butter News

Full Story At  msnbc.com

At least two cases of the human swine influenza have been confirmed in Kansas and one more in California, bringing the U.S. total to 11 and stoking fears that the virus could trigger a pandemic.

At least eight students at a New York City high school probably have swine flu, but health officials said Saturday they don’t know whether they have the same strain of the virus that has killed scores of people in Mexico.

A strain of the flu has killed as many as 81 people and sickened more than 1,300 across Mexico. The World Health Organization chief said Saturday the strain has “pandemic potential” and it may be too late to contain a sudden outbreak.

Full Story At  Reuters

BEIJING (Reuters) – Chinese dairy firms that sold baby formula tainted with the industrial chemical melamine will pay compensation to the families of nearly 300,000 children who were killed or sickened as a result, state media reported.

Twenty-two dairy producers will soon make one-off cash payments to the families, the Xinhua news agency cited the China Dairy Industry Association as saying on Saturday.

It did not disclose the size of the payments.

Full Story At  Reuters

OZNAN, Poland (Reuters) – An ancient technique of plowing charred plants into the ground to revive soil may also trap greenhouse gases for thousands of years and forestall global warming, scientists said on Friday.

Heating plants such as farm waste or wood in airtight conditions produces a high-carbon substance called biochar, which can store the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide and enhance nutrients in the soil.

Plants absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as they grow. Subsequently storing that carbon in the soil removes the gas from the atmosphere.