Should High Risk Children Be Red Tagged?

Primary school children should be eligible for the DNA database if they exhibit behaviour indicating they may become criminals in later life, according to Britain's most senior police forensics expert. Gary Pugh, director of forensic sciences at Scotland Yard and the new DNA spokesman for the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), said a debate was needed on how far Britain should go in identifying potential offenders, given that some experts believe it is possible to identify future offending traits in children as young as five. 'If we have a primary means of identifying people before they offend, then in the long-term the benefits of targeting younger people are extremely large,' said Pugh. 'You could argue the younger the better. Criminologists say some people will grow out of crime; others won't. We have to find who are possibly going to be the biggest threat to society.' Pugh admitted that the deeply controversial suggestion raised issues of parental consent, potential stigmatisation and the role of teachers in identifying future offenders, but said society needed an open, mature discussion on how best to tackle crime before it took place

Schizophrenia Risk May Start in Womb

Over the past several decades, a steady stream of studies has documented that people born in winter and spring have an increased risk for schizophrenia, a serious mental illness characterized by disordered thinking, hallucinations and other psychotic symptoms.
Explanations for the increased risk have ranged from the astrological -- different signs of the zodiac have been associated with various mental problems -- to accounts that suggested the risk came from seasonal variations in sunlight.
In recent months and years, scientists have developed a different explanation: Studies show the increased risk of schizophrenia appears linked to maternal infections during the first and second trimesters of pregnancy -- especially flu infections. Since the flu peaks in the fall, this might explain why babies born in the winter and spring have the higher risk.

How Are You Likely to Die?

This is a graphical way of displaying relative risk for dying from a variety of causes.