The Sydney Morning Herald du lieu suivant : Sydney, New South Wales, Australia • Page 3

News 3 smh.com.au Tuesday, April 24, 2001 Ehf jSjjbnqj Pnrning rralb Cholesterol drag costs out of control a Mark Metherell A blow-out in the use of cholesterol-lowering drugs has forced the Federal Government to consider politically risky restrictions on patients' access to subsidised supplies of the life-saving medicine. The cholesterol drugs, known as statins, have become the most expensive item on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, costing Australians $545 million last year. Leaked Cabinet documents have revealed the Government is considering introducing restric tions on the drugs, resulting in about 65,000 patients losing subsidies to them. This would save $103.9 million over four years. But according to Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme data seen by the Herald, the amount saved would be less than the increased cost of the drugs in the past two years a total of about $120 million, $110 million of which was borne by the taxpayer.

The price of the statins to the Government is $55 to $60 a prescription, compared with the $21.90 standard subsidised prescription cost, or $3.50 for pensioners. earlier removal of subsidies on some common medications. A leading cardiologist, Professor Aubrey Pitt, said that while the cholesterol-lowering drugs were costly, he did not support tougher restrictions. Professor Pitt, a former member of the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee, said the statins had proved to be extremely effective in reducing disease and death in patients with a history of heart disease and those vulnerable to heart disease. Editorial Page 14 Government, the specialists or health funds would see it in their best interests to widen gaps.

Mr McCallum said the Government's proposals to increase costs for diabetes agents and syringes and lower specialist rebates would increase the burdens on the chronically ill, who often had the least resources. The director of the Council on the Ageing, Mr Denys Correll, said older people were most likely to be affected but were already battling with the impact of increased user-pays, higher bank fees, the GST, higher petrol prices, and the Sudden deaths of four siblings one-in-a-trillion chance, court told surgeons' leader warned of a blow-out in medical where insured patients pay extra to cover medical bills. The president of the Australian Association of Surgeons, Mr Graeme Brazenor, said if the Government were to freeze specialists' rebates, "any thoughts of narrowing gaps has gone out the The Federal Government has hailed the increase in no-gap insurance cover as one of the big successes of its drive to increase health insurance. But Mr Brazenor said surgeons had already in (I daughters, but claims they were victims of TT Commuters make most of their no-fare day Andrew Stevenson Public transport unions claimed their Sydney rail and bus fare-free day was a resounding success yesterday, with patronage up by more than 10 per cent. Thousands of rail commuters did a double-take in front of ticket windows that were either closed or manned by staff who would not sell them a ticket.

The action was part of a trade union campaign against changes proposed for the State's workers' compensation scheme. The assistant secretary of the Australian Services Union, Mr George Panigiris, said the public response had been "We couldn't believe the number of people using the trains. Our members are reporting crowds were up by 10 to 15 per cent," he said The industrial action across the train and bus network yesterday cost the State Government more than $4 million, Mr Panigiris said. Further industrial action was on the agenda. "Mr Carr seems to be hardening his position about this.

I don't think it would be just a fare-free day next time." It is estimated more than 700,000 rail and bus commuters rode free. But few who spoke to the Herald yesterday knew for the reason for the dispute. Trade union pressure has also resulted in three right-wing MPs adding their names to a Labor Council list in support of amendments to the planned changes. Provisional support for amendments has been offered by 38 of the Government's 52 backbenchers. The Government Whip, Mr George Thompson, released a letter he sent to the Minister for Industrial Relations, Mr Delia Bosca, in which he says he "will fully support amendments that give further support to the protection of injured The member for Miranda, Mr Barry Collier, and the member for Kogarah, Ms Cherie Burton, have adopted a similar position.

Mr Collier denied he had been strong-armed by the union movement, which had targeted his office for a protest yesterday. The Labor Council pointed out that, after not responding for a fortnight, he had clarified his position 24 hours before the protest. Further protests are planned this week for the offices of the member for Auburn, Mr Peter Nagle, and the member for South Coast, Mr Wayne Smith. In another development, the Electrical Trades Union joined the campaign yesterday, announcing plans for an indefinite ban on union maintenance of lifts in ministerial offices in Sydney. The ban, on lifts in the Governor Macquarie Tower and Parliament House, was to take effect from midnight last night.

Ellen Connolly Kathleen Folbigg's solicitor called the deaths a but the prosecution told Maitland Local Court it was murder. Dressed in oversized prison greens, Kathleen Folbigg, 33, was led into court yesterday afternoon, four days after being charged with murdering her children: sons Caleb, 20 months, and Patrick, eight months, and daughters Sarah, months, and Laura, 18 months, between February 1989 and March 1999. At the back of the courtroom sat her boyfriend of eight months who, the court heard, had asked Folbigg to marry him. In opposing the bail application, police prosecutor Sergeant Daniel Maher said that while each child's individual death had not raised much concern, their collective deaths could only be attributed to suffocation. Sergeant Maher said medical evidence from a United States forensic pathologist, Dr Janice Ophoven, showed that the chances of cot death being responsible were "a trillion to "What that means is this is the only case that has occurred in the world.

It's just not likely." He said the circumstances surrounding the deaths were not consistent with sudden infant death syndrome, or cot death. This included the fact each child was found face up, they were still warm when found, and that in two of the cases the OFF THE LIST Brand names of cholesterol drugs likely to be subject to restrictions include Zocor, Lipex, Pravachol, Lipitor, Vastin and Lescol. The prescription of one popular brand, Atorvastatin, produced by Pfizer, rose by 63 per cent between 1999 and last year, when its cost alone to the Government was $176 million. While seniors groups criticised plans to increase medication costs for diabetes patients and reduce Medicare specialists' rebates, a Accused of killing her two sons and two ressed, the computer became progressively better at linking emotion to the sound of the human voice. By the end of the training, the computer was able to sense the correct emotion about 50 per cent of the time, no matter who was speaking to it.

According to the researchers, computer was better at spotting certain emotions, however. 'The recognition rates for sadness, disgust, fear and surprise were uniformly higher than the recognition rates for joy," Dr Nicholson said. With computers more often being associated with rage and frustration than bliss, experts are unlikely to see" this as a serious failing. Professor Robert Spence, an authority on human-computer interactions at London's Imperial College, said previous attempts to make computers more user-friendly had had a chequered history: "These things can be very intrusive." He added, however, that computers could become easier to work with. "I could see this being used to allow computers to change the interface they use when they sense that users are not responding well." The Sunday Telegraph, London 3 Hello Boys show form after creased their fees recently because of soaring malpractice insurance premiums.

Any cut or freeze on specialist rebates would mean "specialists gaps are going to blow out The president of the Consumer Health Forum, Mr Lou McCallum, said there would be pressure on gaps. "There will have to be an increase in premiums or a reluctance by health funds to cover the gap," he said. However, the director of the Australian Health Insurance Association, Mr Russell Schneider, said he did not believe the sudden infant death syndrome Kathleen characters Rampaging Roy Slaven and H.G. Nelson finds them comfortable and very relaxed. And well it should, with its familiar opening slab of an H.G.

spray preparing the way for Roy to bite hard, and then an open market on weighty matters. This is a show ostensibly about sport but, as they've shown us for years, sport is life is sport is life. So it's natural to move from Collingwood Football Club and horse racing to Lucien Freud and and lack of a map or compass, Mr Maloney insisted: "I took the right and rejected the need for the route-finding tools. "I knew where I was all the time," he said. During his.

ordeal, Mr Maloney, from Geelong in Victoria, is claimed to have been trapped in a relatively small area of the far south of Tasmania's wilderness. In his account to Channel 7's Today Tonight, he gave few details about the passage of those days. He said that after hearing a rescue helicopter, he camped for six days in one place waiting for rescuers who never came. POST- rare SPECIAL REPORT published in Thursday 23 2001 1 Sensitive new-age computers just as likely to swear back Folbigg arriving at court yesterday. Photo: a spell in the a stray todger.

There is no difficulty at all in switching from a dodgy mime by Ricky Martin at the Logies to body building footage given the "hello-boys" style commentary from Roy and H.G. As they found with Club Buggery, interviews with celebrity guests (on this night it was in-house Channel 7 star and Gold Logie winner Georgie Parker) can slow the pace. But, as The Dream showed, Doyle in particular is a master at The Monday Dump Channel 7, 10.30 pm Monday Reviewed by Bernard Zuel Why change a winning formula? It worked more often than not as Club Buggery, it worked a treat for two weeks as The Dream and it has been working for more than a decade on radio. With that behind you, why should you even consider a new method? John Doyle's and Greig Pickhaver's new outing for their infants showed signs of life. Extensive tests had ruled out the possibility the children suffered fatal genetic or viral disorders, he said.

Although they were admittedly circumstantial, police alleged that entries in a diary owned by Kathleen Folbigg also went to her partial admission of guilt, Sergeant Maher said. In one diary entry, she had written: "I am my father's daughter." He had taken this as I am my father's daughter. Diary entry from Kathleen Folbigg, whose father was convicted of murdering her mother in 1969. a reference to Folbigg's father, Thomas, who was convicted of murdering her mother, Kathleen, in January 1969. But her solicitor, Mr Brian Doyle, said the deaths were a coincidence.

He said the Crown case was weak and there was no direct evidence. "Every one of the children was in fact ill in their lifetime before their death," Mr Doyle said. He said the medical experts had come to their conclusions after being supplied with Folbigg's diaries and other statements. "So, what we have got at the end, wholly and solely, is coincidences," Mr Doyle said. The magistrate, Mr Richard Wakely, refused bail due to the seriousness of the charges.

Folbigg will reappear in Newcastle Court on May 15. puters to behave as if they are made up of networks of crude "brain As with real brains, these networks can be trained to recognise patterns by being exposed to examples repeatedly, and then told what the patterns mean. To construct their emotionally sensitive computer, Dr John Nicholson and colleagues at ATR Research Laboratories in Kyoto trained a neural network using 100 different speakers, who spoke to the computer using a large list of words with emotions ranging from surprise and joy to sadness and disgust. In each case, the computer was told which emotion to associate with what it was hearing through its microphone. As training prog- 'is are big on choice can now ZftS detect that youran3er has turned -5j 1 Grant Turner paddock rescuing an interview, even if only with a raised eyebrow.

The harsh view may be that there's nothing new in this new show. And the ABC's The Fat has taken up some of the territory Roy and H.G. would like. But those who've watched Roy and H.G. for years must remember commercial TV audiences had never really seen them before The Dream.

The verdict? First outing and will be the better for the run. The show looks a winner. warded for his own carelessness," Mr Rubock said. The Tasmanian Government will consider compelling solo bushwalkers to carry an emergency transmitting beacon as a result of this rescue. Tasmania's Opposition police spokesman, Mr Rene Hidding, said the rescue had cost a minimum of $25,000.

'There is an opportunity to ask this person, now he has the money, to consider making a contribution," Mr Hidding said. "I do believe the minister could send him an account and ask him to consider donating to the volunteers." I did it my way: miracle survivor raises hackles in Tasmania The Police Minister, Mr David Llewellyn, declined to say whether Mr Maloney should pay. "I guess it's up to Benjamin whether he makes an offer to government with regard to that." The interview with Today Tonight came after police sources confirmed that the only other person who could shed light on Mr Maloney's ordeal had gone overseas. ATasmanian-based friend, Mr Mark Burnell, left Mr Maloney on Mount La Perouse after they had walked for about two days, and was the last person to see him before he disappeared. Andrew Darby in Hobart Bushwalking survivor Mr Ben Maloney has angered his rescuers by insisting he was properly prepared for his walk in the Tasmanian wilderness that turned into a 35-day ordeal.

Amid growing public irritation over the cost of the search for the 27-year-old former soldier, Mr Maloney made no apology for his actions or preparations. Nor did he offer any repayment to those who had helped him. In answer to repeated expert criticism of his light equipment Robert Matthews in London The days of being able to scream at computers with impunity are running out after the emergence of the first computer able to recognise emotions. The computer, developed by scientists in Japan, can detect signs of a range of emotional states in the voices of users, including anger, fear and disgust -probably the most frequently expressed emotions when dealing with computers. The breakthrough opens the way to computers that can offer electronic sympathy after a hard day at the keyboard and grovelling apologies when they dump files or print the wrong document.

More worrying, it also brings computers another step closer to the abilities of Hal, the murderous machine in the science-fiction film 2001: A Space Odyssey. In a strange case of life mimicking art, not only has the emotionally sensitive computer emerged right on schedule, but it exploits the very technology used by the fictional Hal. Known as neural computing, this involves programming com- Phone us on Ben Maloney after his ordeal. One of the volunteers who spent four days searching for Mr Maloney in difficult conditions, Mr Greg Rubock of South Hobart, was strongly critical of Today Tonight's payment for the story. "He's more or less being re DC DC LU CO LARGE SITE of Block 182 div Borders Close to Canberra Close to Defence Close to Fyshwick SUGGESTED USAGES INCLUDE: Sub-division Potential Recyclable materials, waste disposal Freight transport facilities Meat processing facilities Waste transfer station Warehousing and storage 33.8359 hectares Jerrabomberra, DP2244 Sydney-Canberra rail line Airport Establishments Industrial area Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal of new south wales Invitation to Tender Review of Capital Expenditure and Operating Expenditure in the NSW Department of Land and Water Conservation's State Water Business The Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal of New South Wales (IPART) is conducting a review of bulk water services provided by the NSW Department of Land and Water Conservation (DLWC), through its State Water business, in order to set maximum prices for those services.

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