CDC issues international TB alert
ATLANTA, May 30 (UPI) -- U.S. health officials issued an international health alert and ordered a Georgia man with drug-resistant TB hospitalized under guard after he traveled abroad.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was trying to contact passengers who flew with the Atlanta-area man on a May 12 Air France flight from Atlanta to Paris and a May 24 Czech Air flight from Prague to Montreal to tell them they may have been exposed to the dangerous strain of tuberculosis.
The man traveled to Greece for his wedding and was on a honeymoon in Rome when the CDC contacted him and told him to report to an isolation unit there for treatment. Instead, he and his new bride flew to Canada to avoid detection by U.S. officials and drove to the United States, where he contacted the CDC, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.
He said he told local and federal health workers about his travel plans.
"I didn't want to put anybody at risk," the man told the Journal-Constitution. "We just wanted to come home and get treatment."
Maliki: U.S. surge prevented civil war
BAGHDAD, May 30 (UPI) -- Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said the surge of U.S. forces that began arriving in February staved off a civil war in his country.
"If the Baghdad security plan had not been implemented, we would have a true civil war in Iraq," Maliki told CBS News.
Maliki said he's optimistic the surge of troops will result in more progress in Iraq in the coming months. He also acknowledged in a CBS interview that life is hard for people living in Baghdad.
"There are great shortages in Baghdad because it's the capital and it faces the greatest terrorist threat," Maliki said.
Meanwhile, an adviser to U.S. military commanders in Iraq said the odds are not good for success there.
"If I had to put a number to it, maybe it's a 1-in-10, maybe it's a 1-in-5 long shot if we play our cards right. There's no question that this is likelier to fail than succeed at this point," Stephen Biddle, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, told CBS.
Biddle said success will depend on convincing Iraqi insurgents to accept a cease-fire.
U.S. deaths in Iraq reach year's high
BAGHDAD, May 30 (UPI) -- May has become the deadliest month for U.S. troops in Iraq this year, with 117 fatalities reported, the highest monthly toll since 2004.
The most violent area used to be Anbar province in the west but Diyala province, northeast of Baghdad, has taken the lead, a Los Angeles Times correspondent reported Wednesday.
The shift was somewhat predictable, U.S. Army Lt. Col. Christopher Garver, a U.S. military spokesman, said. He said part of the rise in fatalities was the February build up of troops in Baghdad and the fact the military doubled the number of troops in Diyala to 6,000 this year.
"We knew that one of the outcomes of the increased pressure in Baghdad was you press them in the center, they ooze out the sides," Garver told the Times. "There is also pressure being put on al-Qaida in Al Anbar as well, so we are seeing Diyala become the new hotspot."
The U.S. troop death toll in Anbar has dropped significantly this year, as U.S. commanders say tribes dropped allegiance to al-Qaida and cooperated with U.S. forces, the report said.
Report: Fred Thompson to run in 2008
WASHINGTON, May 30 (UPI) -- Advisers to former U.S. senator and now "Law and Order" star Fred Thompson said he is planning a 2008 Republican presidential bid, Politico.com reported.
The 64-year-old is scheduled to make the announcement during the Fourth of July holiday in Nashville, and a fundraising committee will begin work next Monday, the advisers said.
However, campaign spokesman Mark Corallo said Thompson, R-Tenn., could still decide not to run or to postpone the announcement.
Thompson's top rivals -- Rudolph Giuliani, John McCain and Mitt Romney -- have a significant fundraising advantage for the current quarter, although the report said Thompson spent Tuesday afternoon in a conference call with more than 100 potential donors, each of whom was asked to raise about $50,000, the report said.
Since Thompson began hinting he might get in, polls have generally showed him tied for third with Romney, the report said.
Woman dies because of electricity cutoff
AUCKLAND, New Zealand, May 30 (UPI) -- New Zealand police are investigating the death of a woman after the power supply to her oxygen pump was cut because of an unpaid bill.
Pre-school teacher Foloie Muliaga, 44, died within two hours of the state-run Mercury Energy Company cutting off the electricity supply to her home in Mangere, near Auckland, her son told reporters.
Letitaia Muliaga said on a TV-One news program the company contractor had told him he was "just doing his job."
Mercury Energy General Manager James Moulder said, "We were simply unaware that loss of electricity to the household was putting a vulnerable customer at risk."
The local police chief, Inspector Bruce Bird, said officers would investigate Muliaga's death and then make a decision regarding charges based "on what the facts tell us."
