Regardless of what we feel about the war in Iraq, most Americans feel a deep connection to the men and women in uniform who are there fighting for us. But we don't often think about the people who are caring for them on our behalf, the nurses and doctors who are putting their lives at risk to tend the wounded. People like U.S. Navy Commander Maureen Pennington. Pennington, 45, is the first nurse to lead a surgical company during combat ...

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's carefully cultivated image as a modest leader with reformist leanings, close to his people and understanding of their concerns, has taken a severe beating after a month of brutal security measures against a burgeoning civil protest movement for greater freedoms that has slowly stretched across the country. The tall, trim, blue-eyed father of three has responded to the uprising in his country, the greatest challenge to his 11-year rule, with a characteristic mix ...

The baby now named Tessa Leavitt was born in a motel bathtub on the night of June 18, 2005. Her mother cleaned her, breast-fed her and cut the umbilical cord herself. The next day, the young Hispanic woman swaddled the infant in a white towel and took her to Fire Station 15 in Whittier, Calif., where she rang the doorbell and told the firefighters, "I want to give up my baby." When the paramedics arrived 30 minutes later, she put the ...

There it was, glowing on the computer screen next to each patient's name, and repeated again, up on the emergency-department tracking board: "Abd Pn," the abbreviation for abdominal pain. It appeared again and again, 12 times. As other ER staff around me examined the board, the groans began. Anyone who works in an emergency department knows why: treating patients with belly pain is the ER doctor's booby prize. Invariably, care involves dealing with bodily fluids, internal exams and ...

Submerged in 40-ft.-deep tanks of blue, boron-infused water, nearly 50,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel are stored near the 104 nuclear reactors in the U.S. Industry officials say it is perfectly safe to keep there. "You can stand right above a fuel pool" and not get sick, says Tom Kaufman, a spokesman for the Nuclear Energy Institute, which represents the nuclear-power industry. Safe or not, spent-fuel storage will be a significant part of a 90-day review ...

A top Taliban political leader delivered a message Friday to President Obama, calling his attempt to lure away Taliban fighters with money "an old weapon that has failed already." Obama meets Friday with the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who will tell the U.S. leader how a large deployment to Afghanistan would affect the military. Akhund warned Obama against maintaining a military presence in Afghanistan, saying it "will only deepen your economic crisis and will harm your international reputation." "Pull all ...

Broadening the number of health care professionals who can administer vaccine, New York Gov. David Paterson issued a sweeping executive order Thursday officially declaring a state of emergency due to the increase in H1N1 cases, including 75 H1N1-related deaths in New York state.

A major earthquake vibrated deep in Indonesia's Banda Sea on Saturday night, but the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center predicted the quake would not be destructive.The officials didn't want their names used because they were not authorized to speak on the record. Obama's action allows Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius "to temporarily waive or modify certain requirements" to help health care facilities enact emergency plans to deal with the pandemic. Those requirements are contained in Medicare, Medicaid and state ...

At least 30 people died and 70 were wounded in shelling on a marketplace in the Somali capital of Mogadishu Thursday, according to journalists and emergency services. A local journalist called the rocket fire on Bakara market "unprecedented." "This was the most brutal shelling," according to an ambulance service representative who said they had picked up 61 wounded, but expect the number to climb. Other victims were being brought to hospitals by family and friends. The source ...

A powerful typhoon lumbered toward the storm-battered Philippines on Monday, as the death toll from two devastating storms in the last month climbed to 858. Typhoon Lupit, packing winds of 109 miles per hour (175 km per hour), was expected to hit land Thursday, the National Disaster Coordinating Council said. It was hovering about 720 miles (1,160 km) east of Cagayan, the northernmost province. The government placed emergency teams on standby and stockpiled food, blankets and water. It fears landslides ...