Theto Ngobeni was just 18 days old when doctors first inserted a shunt into the back of her head to drain excess fluid accumulating in her brain. She was born with a condition known as hydrocephalus, which doctors said was caused by a listeriosis infection that her mother contracted while pregnant. Now seven, Theto has already had six operations to ...

Store closures in the U.S. last year hit the highest level since the pandemic — and even more locations are expected to shutter this year, as shoppers’ dollars increasingly go to a few industry winners, according to an analysis by Coresight Research. Major retailers, including Party City and Macy’s, closed 7,325 stores in 2024, according to the retail advisory group’s data. That’s the ...

UnitedHealthcare on Thursday tapped company veteran Tim Noel as its new CEO following the targeted killing of its former top executive, Brian Thompson, in Manhattan in December.  Noel was the head of Medicare and retirement at UnitedHealthcare, the largest private health insurer in the U.S. It is the insurance arm of UnitedHealth Group, the nation’s biggest health-care conglomerate based on revenue and its ...

A war of words between Elon Musk and Sam Altman escalated on social media Thursday, as two of the most powerful men in tech sparred over their rival artificial intelligence initiatives.  The latest exchange began after OpenAI, where Altman is CEO, was revealed as a key player in Stargate, the AI infrastructure project President Donald Trump announced this week that is ...

Micheál Martin became Ireland’s taoiseach (prime minister) for the second time in his political career on Thursday, a day later than planned. The Irish parliament descended into uproar on Wednesday, its first day back in session after weeks of political horse-trading and coalition-building, following the country’s general election in November. Wednesday’s order of business was scheduled to start with the ...

Taiwan plans to cull up to 120,000 green iguanas, with supporters urging humane methods to bring down the animal’s population, which is wreaking havoc on the island’s agricultural sector. Around 200,000 of the reptiles are believed to be in the island’s southern and central areas, which are heavily dependent on farming, according Chiu Kuo-hao of the Forestry and Nature Conservation ...

A British teenager who murdered three young girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance event was jailed for at least 52 years on Thursday, for an atrocity prosecutors said was so violent it appeared he had tried to decapitate one of the victims. On Monday, Axel Rudakubana, 18, admitted carrying out the killings last July in the northern English town of ...

The female Palestinian inmates were made to kneel in a line on a cold evening last Sunday on the grounds of Israel’s Ofer Prison in the occupied West Bank. “This is not a victory for you. We have destroyed and killed in Gaza, in Yemen, in Syria, in Iran. We killed (your) leadership,” one, Rula Hassanein, recalled hearing in a ...

Italy’s high court has upheld the remaining conviction against American Amanda Knox, who was jailed and later acquitted of the 2007 murder of her British roommate Meredith Kercher. Knox was convicted of slandering her former boss Patrick Lumumba by falsely accusing him of Kercher’s murder. Knox, 20 at the time, signed two statements prepared by police regarding her accusation against ...

The United Kingdom and Ireland are bracing for what could be one of the most severe storms seen in years, with authorities shutting schools and warning residents to stay in. Storm Éowyn, an extratropical “bomb” cyclone that has formed in the North Atlantic and intensified rapidly, is expected to bring gusty winds, heavy rain and some snow to the region. ...