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US ENDORSES TOBACCO POUCHES AS LESS RISKY THAN CIGARETTES

WASHINGTON (AP) — For the first time, U.S. health regulators have endorsed a type of smokeless tobacco as a less harmful alternative to smoking.

Under Tuesday’s decision, Swedish Match will be able to advertise that its tobacco pouches carry a lower risk of cancer, bronchitis and other diseases than cigarettes.

It’s the first time the Food and Drug Administration has endorsed a tobacco product as a way to reduce the deadly impact of smoking.

Swedish Match has sold its tobacco pouches in the U.S. for more than a decade.

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ITALY’S NEXT MOVE VS. RACISM: ANTI-TERRORISM LISTENING TOOLS

ROME (AP) — After five cases of racist chants in eight rounds of Serie A, the Italian soccer federation is considering employing advanced listening devices used in anti-terrorism operations to identify offending fans.

Federation president Gabriele Gravina has detailed “a passive radar device that uses directional microphones to determine the source of the noise. It can immediately determine who is making a racist chant — or it can illustrate the trajectory of fireworks.”

Gravina adds that the tool being considered requires two panels per stadium section, is not overly expensive and is made by an Italian company.

He says the only obstacle is Italy’s privacy laws, “because (the device) can also listen to private conversations inside the stadium.”

The federation is co-ordinating with the Interior Ministry with the aim of testing the tools during Italy’s European Championship qualifier against Armenia in Palermo, Sicily, next month.

SOUTH POLE’S OZONE HOLE SHRINKS TO SMALLEST SINCE DISCOVERY

WASHINGTON (AP) — NASA reports the ozone hole near the South Pole this year is the smallest since it was discovered in 1985.

Scientists say this is due more to freakishly warm Antarctic weather than the decades long effort to reduce the use of chlorinated chemicals that cause the seasonal gap. Earth’s protective ozone layer shields life from harmful ultraviolet radiation.

Chlorine in the air needs cold temperatures in the stratosphere to convert into a form of the chemical that eats ozone.

This fall, the average hole in the ozone layer is 3.6 million square miles (9.3 million square kilometres). That’s down from a peak of 10 million square miles (25.9 million square kilometres) in 1998. This year’s hole is even smaller than the one first discovered in 1985.

COMPANY SAYS IT WILL SEEK APPROVAL OF ALZHEIMER’S DRUG

The drug company Biogen Inc. says it will seek federal approval for a medicine to treat early Alzheimer’s disease, a landmark step toward finding a treatment that can alter the course of the most common form of dementia.

The announcement Tuesday is a surprise because the company earlier this year stopped two studies of the drug when partial results suggested it was not working. The company now says a new analysis of more results suggest that the drug helped reduce a decline of thinking skills at the highest dose.

The drug (called aducanumab) aims to help the body clear harmful plaques from the brain. Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Biogen is developing it with a Japanese company, Eisai Co. Ltd.

Shares of Biogen soared 36% to $305 in pre-market trading Tuesday.

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WASHINGTON STATE STUDENTS USING DRONES TO STUDY ALGEBRA

SEDRO-WOOLLEY, Wash. (AP) — Students at a Washington state high school are building and using aerial drones in a high-tech extension of traditional math studies.

The Skagit Valley Herald reports that students in advanced algebra class at Sedro-Woolley High School are using RubiQ-brand drones to chart distance, speed and create graphs.

The students also work in small groups to assemble the drones before learning to fly them and collect data needed to complete their algebra assignments.

Kathy Chace and Jason Dilley teach the new class, which is part of series of courses offered at the high school incorporating the real world with principles of STEM, short for science, technology, engineering, and math.

Dilley says students who complete the class will earn a career and technical education credit, as well as a math credit.

SEAWORLD RELEASES RESCUED MANATEE BACK INTO FLORIDA WATERS

OAK HILL, Fla. (AP) — A manatee named Bingley has been released back into waters off Florida after treatment of an injury.

The manatee was found injured in May by the Florida Wildlife Commission and treated at SeaWorld’s Marine Animal Rescue facility.

SeaWorld officials who released the 440-pound (200-kilogram) creature last week in Oak Hill on the Atlantic coast say Bingley had been hit by a watercraft, damaging one of its lungs.

“He was floating high, which is a very abnormal for a manatee. He was unable to dive,” said SeaWorld Orlando veterinarian Stacy DiRocco, adding the injury had made Bingley unable to forage at the time.

SeaWorld says it has rescued 36,000 ill, stranded and orphaned sea animals since the early 1970s with the goal of treating and returning them to the wild.