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SIAYA, Kenya ?C A mother watched with dread as a nurse inserted a tube in her baby's head. Blood streamed into the anemic 4-month-old who already has malaria, the mosquito-borne disease that kills a million African children every year."Malaria is one of the deadliest sicknesses for children," the nurse said — words that sent the young mother into a crumpled heap on the bed beside her wide-eyed baby boy, wrapped in a blue-and-yellow floral blanket.There is new hope, however, in this verdant area where President Barack Obama's relatives live. A vaccine that appears to be able to prevent the disease in about 50 percent of children, is now undergoing the final stage of testing.If regulators determine the vaccine is safe, it could be on the market in three to five years — the first vaccine against a human parasite.Tens of millions of Africans are plagued by malaria every year, and more than a third of the hospital beds in this rural Kenyan region next to Lake Victoria are dedicated to its victims. More than 1 million children die of the disease in Africa annually, a crippling economic drain that prolongs a cycle of disease and poverty throughout the continent.Malaria is also prevalent in parts of Asia, the Middle East and Central and South America.This vaccine was developed specifically for Africa, however, and will only prevent the African strain of the disease. Experts say it would be a historic advancement."Some may say, '50 percent, that's not great.' And that's true. If you get a measles vaccine, you're not going to get measles again," said Dr. Dave Jones, a U.S. Army colonel and director of a clinic in nearby Kombewa operated by the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research and the Kenya Medical Research Institute."But at the same time, when you consider we lose 1 million kids a year, if you could cut that in half it would be a great step forward."Experts from around the globe are meeting in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, this week as part of the fifth pan-African malaria conference, and a news conference on the vaccine trial is scheduled for Tuesday.More than $500 million has been spent on the combined efforts by drug maker GlaxoSmithKline and the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, which is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The Phase III testing is being done at 11 sites in seven African countries on 16,000 children under the age of 18 months.The goal is to immunize children against malaria during their youngest high-risk years, and then for them to develop their own natural immunities as they age.At the spartan, open-air clinic in Kombewa last week, Patrician Mrunde, a 34-year-old mother of six, sat in the hallway with her youngest, 6-month-old Linda, who was waiting to receive a shot as part of the trial.Mrunde has seen her eldest child stricken with fever and lapse into convulsions from malaria, and a young relative die from it."I decided to join the study to get help for the disease," she said.Dr. Allen Otieno, a 38-year-old pediatrician, said "everybody is afraid" of malaria in the region. He called the new vaccine promising. "As scientists we have great hope that it will reduce the burden of malaria," he said.Joe Cohen, a top researcher for GlaxoSmithKline, said all the data collected during testing have been encouraging.The 66-year-old Cohen, who has been working on a malaria vaccine for two decades, said the trial results will be submitted to regulators in 2012, and that a vaccine could be on the market shortly afterward.No prices have been set for the vaccine, Cohen said, though families in Africa may not have to pay anything for it because the Gates Foundation, UNICEF, WHO and the GAVI Alliance would provide funds.GlaxoSmithKline "is committed to making sure pricing will never be a barrier to access for this vaccine," Cohen said.The vaccine has been in development for more than 20 years through the combined efforts of GlaxoSmithKline, the Malaria Vaccine Initiative, the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research and others."No single person could have ever achieved this," Cohen said. "That's the lesson that should be taken out of the collaboration."Malaria is caused by a parasite and spreads through a bite from an infected mosquito. The parasite travels quickly to the liver where it matures, enters the bloodstream and causes fever, chills, flu-like symptoms and anemia. The vaccine is designed to attack the parasite before it can infect the liver.Until now, the main line of defense in preventing the disease has been distribution of bed nets and mosquito spraying.Jonathan Odro Anyumba, chairman of the board of the Kombewa district hospital, said malaria is a huge burden in this verdant area of Kenya, where many live in mud huts and collect water in plastic jugs from flowing streams.Families must sleep under nets to protect against the disease, though many don't have any. Even half the beds at his hospital don't have nets, Anyumba said."When you visit these areas you'll find that each and every child has malaria. Thirty to 50 percent of the deaths in this community are from malaria," he said. "I think this vaccine is going to be very, very useful." nike sb

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) ?C Some 14,700 rich Americans worried about a U.S. government crackdown on offshore tax cheats came forward to participate in a tax amnesty program, the top U.S. tax official said on Tuesday.Puma shoes in the Internal Revenue Service's amnesty program was "unprecedented" and the final number was nearly double the agency's estimate in October, U.S. Internal Revenue Service Commissioner Douglas Shulman told reporters in a telephone briefing.The nike shoes amnesty program, which ended in October, offered reduced penalties for wealthy Americans who voluntarily disclosed previously undeclared foreign bank accounts and assets. "We were flooded with people coming in the final days of the program," Shulman said."The nike air max has never got anything like that in response to prior initiatives," said Barbara Kaplan, a lawyer for high net- worth clients in New York. "It's a little higher than I anticipated based on the pace of my own practice and the panic that was out there."While agency officials were still analyzing the amount of offshore assets and bank accounts disclosed, Shulman said "we are talking about billions of dollars coming into the U.S. treasury" from the amnesty program.Of the 14,700 newly disclosed accounts, Shulman said many involved bank accounts in Switzerland and Europe, but assets were also hidden in more than 70 countries."The whole nike shoes around bank secrecy, around offshore (tax) evasion is changing" because of pressure from the U.S. Justice Department and from international capital markets, he said.At the center of the U.S. efforts to combat tax evasion abroad is a case against Swiss banking giant UBS AG, which led the bank to agree to reveal the names of 4,450 client accounts.Shulman also said the outpouring of hidden offshore accounts does not affect in any way the obligation of UBS to turn over those American account-holder names. There had been some speculation that success in the amnesty program would cut the obligation of UBS to turn over accounts."Some have misinterpreted this," Shulman said.Although the amnesty program has ended, Shulman encouraged Americans with hidden offshore assets to continue to come forward and talk with the IRS about them. "It will be much worse for them if we find them first," he said.CRITERIAThe U.S. and Swiss governments also released on Tuesday the criteria it used to arrive at the 4,450 accounts that parties agreed UBS would eventually turn over to U.S. authorities.The Swiss Justice Department said it would hand over the names of wealthy U.S. clients of UBS with accounts holding more than 1 million Swiss francs ($986,200) where there is a reasonable suspicion of tax fraud.Accounts of a lesser size could come under the deal where there is a "scheme of lies" identified, according to the document.Air force ones describes suspicious activity that could be interpreted as tax fraud including the use of debit cards, cell phones or wire transfers to hide accounts.Shulman said the agreement will give the U.S. accounts it is most interested in -- those where taxpayers exhibited the most egregious behavior, those that would be hardest for the U.S. to identify and accounts with the largest holdings.Submission of data to U.S. authorities applies to UBS accounts held between 2001 and 2008 by U.S. citizens.(Reporting by Kim Dixon, with additional reporting by Jason Rhodes in Bern, Switzerland; Writing by Julie Vorman, Editing by Maureen Bavdek)

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MELBOURNE, Australia ?C A Bangladeshi toddler separated this week from her conjoined twin sister was talking and behaving normally after being woken Thursday from a medically induced coma, the head of the surgery team said.Jordans were already doing well enough that she could leave intensive care, said Wirginia Maixner, director of neurosurgery at Royal Children's Hospital."Nike sb looks brilliant, she is talking, she is being Trishna, she is behaving the way she always has," Maixner told reporters. "She's phenomenally good."Her sister, Krishna, will be slowly brought out of the coma later Thursday, Maixner said. Krishna will have a longer period of adjustment as the separation brought more changes to her body and brain's blood circulation.Maixner said they hoped to have an indication Thursday night or early Friday about how Krishna's brain was responding. MRI scans Wednesday showed no signs of brain injury.Maixner said there may be minor changes to the girls from where their brains were separated but that overall the brains looked fantastic."I can tell you that it's not until i saw that scan that I had my first breath of relief," she said, revealing she did a short "chicken dance" when she saw the positive images. "The scans look great. I believe we've brought them through safely. I believe that the girls will come out really, really good."The twins, nike dunks turn 3 next month, had been joined at the top of their heads and shared brain tissue and blood vessels. They were separated Tuesday after 25 hours of delicate surgery, and then underwent an additional six hours of reconstructive work.Doctors had earlier said there was a 50-50 chance that one of the girls could suffer brain damage from the complicated separation.An aid worker first saw Trishna and Krishna in a Bangladeshi orphanage in 2007 when they were only a month old, and arranged for them to be brought to Australia.