This is the haul police made in Los Diques, Cartago,
 Saturday when they arrested a suspected crack cocaine
 dealer. The man also carried a revolver and nearly
 600,000 colons in cash.

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Woman playing Santa
dies from knife slashes


Jealousy got the best of a man in Boca San Carlos about 6 a.m. Sunday, according to investigators. The man, recently separated from his female companion of six years, objected to her going across the Río San Juan to Nicaragua to distribute toys to some young members of her family. The conversation got heated as the 6:30 a.m departure time for a passenger boat drew near.

The man pulled out a knife and began to slash at the woman, said police. They identified her as Aideé Ortiz Espinoza, 26. She died from multiple knife wounds, they said.

The man awaited police in a nearby home, they said. He was identified by the last names of Hernández Álvarez. Police said they recovered the knife.


Slot machines always win
and can spot bogus bills


Who has never thought about getting revenge on a casino slot machine by using fake money? And who has not figured out that casinos probably have some protection against this scam? Well, the Fuerza Pública said that one man took a chance and got himself arrested early Saturday at the Fiesta Casino in Alajuela.

A police summary identified him as Johan Inncoken  Fontana. The Fuerza Pública reported that they were alerted by the casino management that someone had put four false 10,000-colon bills (about $18.50 each) in a slot machine. They said they found 13 other fake bills on the suspect.

Health agency targeting
neglected Latin diseases


With more than 210 million poor people bearing the burden of neglected diseases in Latin America and the Caribbean, the Pan American Health Organization, the Inter-American Development Bank, and partner agencies are setting up a trust fund to control and eliminate these "forgotten" diseases.

Intestinal worm infections, river blindness, leprosy, Chagas disease and schistosomiasis all have an enormous negative impact on developing countries in terms of disease burden, reducing worker productivity and hampering the intellectual and cognitive development of children, said the Pan American Health Organization. The economic impact of these neglected diseases is estimated to be as great as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria, and they are serious obstacles to socioeconomic development and quality of life at all levels in endemic countries, the Washington-based agency said.

However, tools and cost-effective technologies already exist to control and even eliminate many of them, experts at a recent meeting said. Participants at the meeting came from six countries and they discussed the details of a Latin American and Caribbean trust fund for the prevention, control and elimination of neglected and other infectious diseases.

This group of diseases is the most common cause of infection in some 200 million people in the Americas, including tens of millions of cases of intestinal parasitosis, almost 10 million infected with Chagas’ disease.  Other diseases in this group are lymphatic filariasis, onchocerciasis, schistosomiasis, trachoma, helminthic infections transmitted by contact with soil, and human rabies transmitted by dogs.

The health effects of these neglected diseases vary but include anemia, blindness, malnutrition and impaired childhood growth and development, damage to internal organs, permanent long-term physical disability and premature death. Although low-cost, effective interventions are available, the majority of affected people do not have access to them, said the Pan American Health Organization.

Dr. Peter Hotez, coordinator of the Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases, pointed out that international agencies tend to focus on poverty reduction in Africa and Asia, and forget that more than 100 million people in Latin America and the Caribbean live on less than $2 a day.  The neglected diseases, he said, constitute a "perfect storm against the potential for life and development," and while they may not kill people, they severely limit the physical and intellectual potential of millions of children.
 
The Pan American Health Organization and partner agencies are already planning detailed epidemiological mapping of these diseases to establish baselines for elimination efforts. Analyses show that some areas have overlapping incidence of several neglected diseases at the same time, and that soil-transmitted helminths, or intestinal worms, are likely to be present in all countries of the region, the agency said.