ASTRONAUTS TO RETURN
The three American astronauts on the International Space Station should be home by early May. A Russian Soyuz craft to be launched next month will bring the astronauts back to Earth after delivering two Russian cosmonauts and fresh supplies to keep the space station ticking over. The shuttle Discovery was due to take off last week to service the ISS, but all shuttles were grounded last month in the wake of the Columbia accident, leaving NASA entirely reliant upon Russia for manned missions.
DUTCH FLU FEARS
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A flu virus raging through chickens in the Netherlands has caused eye infections in some 30 farm workers. While the infections are mild, virologists are concerned that the bird virus, which has affected more than two dozen farms, could cross-breed with human flu virus to create a potent new strain. 鈥淚n theory this could create a pandemic flu virus,鈥� says Albert Osterhaus of Erasmus University in Rotterdam. More than half a million birds have been slaughtered on farms within a kilometre of the outbreaks.
TOBACCO BILL
The US Department of Justice has demanded that the American tobacco industry repay the $289 billion profits it says were derived from decades of fraudulent and dangerous marketing practices. The demand is part of a lawsuit filed in 1999 that will reach the courts next year. If the case is successful, it could bankrupt the five cigarette companies involved, analysts say. It comes on top of the $206 billion the companies have already agreed to pay as part of a 1998 settlement in separate lawsuits by 46 states.