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I love piano, it’s my favorite instrument. I was lucky enough to spend my formative years with a beautiful piano in our small Los Angeles apartment. I took lessons for a while. Although I had the ear and eye for music, I didn’t have the pinkies. To this day, skillfully crafted and executed piano solos bring me to tears. I have four separate Pandora stations featuring piano. Like I said, I love piano. While the household piano was fairly commonplace in middleclass homes decades ago, few modern homes house the magnificent instrument. Weighing hundreds of pounds — if not tons...

By the time Carnival Cruise Lines' Liberty pulls into Port Everglades this weekend from a transatlantic voyage, more than 700 people on board will have been afflicted with a highly contagious, stomach flu-like illness that appears to be norovirus, the cruise line said Wednesday. The outbreak could be the largest reported in recent years by the cruise industry. "It's impossible for now to say what the source is," said David Forney, chief of the cruise ship sanitation program at the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He said it's likely passengers brought the virus with them when they boarded...

According to CNN....going to be more where that came from

Clarification: Cows Vs. Oysters Story Mar 24, 2004 The Associated Press MARSHALL, Calif. (AP) - In a March 17 story, The Associated Press reported that in 1998 about 170 people got sick after eating raw oysters from Tomales Bay. The story suggested that the origin of the virus was cow manure in runoff from dairy ranches washing into the bay. While the exact source of the -like virus was never determined, scientists believe it came from human waste dumped from a boat or a leaky septic system, according to Gregg Langlois, a marine biologist with the California Department of Health...

About 120 people, mostly University of Georgia students, have been treated since Wednesday for nausea, vomiting and diarrhea, university and local health officials said. Health officials said they believe a virus is causing the ailments. They have not found any evidence linking the students to each other that would suggest food-borne illness. The sick students live in different residence halls and eat at different locations. Lynn Beckmann, an infectious diseases coordinator with the Georgia Division of Public Health, said a few students starting feeling sick on Wednesday, but the majority were hit over the weekend. Students and members of the...

A reward of up to $20,000 was announced Thursday for tips leading to the arrest and charges of a hit-and-run motorist who killed a chemist walking in the Texas Medical Center. Robert Leslie Burghoff, 45, a postdoctoral fellow at Baylor College of Medicine's molecular virology and microbiology department, was walking to his car Nov. 20 when he was hit from behind by a white or light-colored cargo van that jumped the sidewalk in the 1600 block of South Braeswood. Burghoff, a father of three who lived in The Woodlands, had been studying the Norwalk virus plaguing cruise ships. Broken glass...

UPDATED: 8:01 a.m. EDT September 2, 2003 NEW YORK -- More than 300 people aboard a North Atlantic cruise ship became sick with a Norwalk-type virus, causing the vessel to cut its voyage short and head for New York on Tuesday. At least 322 passengers fell ill during an outbreak aboard the Regal Princess, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officials said. The ship, which began its 16-day voyage in Copenhagen, Denmark, docked at Pier 92 on the Hudson River at 6 a.m. Tuesday, cutting its voyage short by two days. Julie Beson, a spokeswoman for Princess Cruises, said,...

A virus grabbing headlines for sickening hundreds of passengers on cruise ships is hitting Metro Detroit. Emergency room workers at Beaumont Hospital, Royal Oak were busy over the weekend handling an increase in norovirus infection cases, Dr Frank McGeorge said. See also:USA: suspected norovirus outbreak at high school in Texas More than 700 students at Cypress Creek High School were absent or sent home on Friday in what may be an outbreak of norovirus infection, the illness notorious for plaguing passengers aboard cruise ships. Canada: current and previous suspected norovirus outbreaks on Via Rail trains Via Rail said yesterday 3...

BOSTON, Jan. 7 (UPI) -- A stomach virus blamed for sickening cruise ship passengers in recent months was reported Tuesday at near epidemic levels in the Boston area. Health officials said many hospital emergency rooms in the region have been swamped with people complaining of severe symptoms of the Norwalk virus, a contagious microbe. "We have about 700 cases" in the Boston area, said John Auerbach, executive director of the Boston Public Health Commission. It is almost at "an epidemic level," he said. Health officials fear the illness is even more widespread in the general public because most individual cases...

- The stomach virus ripping its way through New York City appears to be the same disease that ravaged the cruise ship industry, health officials told The New York Sun.The outbreak of what they believe is the Norwalk virus was first detected in early autumn, the officials said. They are still awaiting final confirmation from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that the virus is the same.“We noticed an increase in hospitalizations,” Dr. Thomas Frieden said. “But we are still waiting to make sure it is the Norwalk virus. The results are not back yet.”Officials told the Sun...

Cases of a winter sickness bug have doubled in the past year and have now reached a record high, it emerged today. Hospitals across London are on the alert for signs of the virus which can spread rapidly through wards and affect hundreds of people at a time. Cases of Norwalk-like virus - named after the Ohio town where it was first identified - are on the increase in the wake of Christmas and the New Year. Experts warned there will almost certainly be large-scale outbreaks of the bug, better known as winter vomiting virus, in the coming weeks as...

Calgary: Norovirus Victims Approach 1000 Nearly 1000 Calgarians have fallen ill to [norovirus] infection since October 2002, prompting the Calgary Health Region to issue a warning on Fri 13 Dec 2002 to those who plan on visiting friends and family in care facilities over the holidays. Since October 2002, 30 locations in the city have had staff, students, and patients affected by the gastrointestinal virus, up drastically from the same period last year, when only one outbreak affecting seven people was reported....USA (Alaska): Outbreak of Gastroenteritis in Ketchikan - Interim Report On 9 Dec 2002, the Section of Epidemiology was...

Ontario: Viral Gastroenteritis Outbreaks in Healthcare Facilities More than 200 Londoners (Canada) are sick with the suspected Norwalk virus infection that has closed hospital and long-term care facilities across the province. Most of the ill are residents and staff at Dearness Home, although there are suspect cases at Parkwood Hospital and a local child-care centre. "We don't know yet if any of these cases are caused by Norwalk virus," said Dr. Bryna Warshawsky, assistant medical officer of health. "But it spreads quickly and we want people who are vomiting or have diarrhea to take precautions so it doesn't spread." At...