Prima Deli serves up salmonella birthday cake

Twenty-three of the 30 family members at the gathering suffered severe food poisoning after eating the birthday cake, a 1.5kg salmonella-laced chocolate cake with nuts from bakery chain Prima Deli.

Among those felled was an 11-month-old baby, who was so ill he had to be admitted to the National University Hospital for three days.

The rest had to put up with fever, diarrhea, shivering and even breathing difficulties, in between repeated visits to their family doctors.

Miss Anizah Yusof, 19, one of the family members who had been stricken, reckons her four-day illness to be the worst episode of diarrhoea she has ever had.

She said: ‘I was also very giddy and couldn’t walk properly, so I just lay down on the bed. It was also very difficult to breathe.’ (story)

Experts brainstorming to deal with gambling addiction

With more than 20 years’ experience dealing with gambling problems in eight different countries, Dr Rachel Volberg has a pretty good idea or what works, and what doesn’t. Setting up services to prevent and treat such addiction before casinos open their doors here in 2009 is a great way to keep the problem contained, she said on Tuesday.

Otherwise, Singapore could end up like the American state of Nevada, where 6 per cent of the adult population is addicted to gambling.

She said: ‘It is incredibly disruptive to their families. They live in chaos, with an average of 25 credit cards by the time they declare bankruptcy.’

‘Their families are badly affected too. Many spouses have stress related health problems like high blood pressure and diabetes. Their kids have a high rate of depression and delinquency, they do poorly in school and many are themselves addicted to drugs, alcohol and gambling.’ (story)

Third Avenue opens office in Singapore

U.S. investment firm Third Avenue Management said on Tuesday it has set up a research office in Singapore to improve its monitoring of Asian companies.

Third Avenue, whose Asian holdings include Cheung Kong, Henderson Land and Toyota Industries, said the Singapore office will be headed by Henry Patner.

The firm is actively seeking to add research professionals to its Singapore office, it said in a statement.(story)

CapitaLand to double investment in Vietnam

Southeast Asia’s biggest property developer CapitaLand Ltd said Tuesday there is potential to double its residential pipeline in Vietnam from 2,800 homes currently to about 6,000 in the next three years. Apart from growing its residential business there, the company is also looking for opportunities in the office, retail, and integrated leisure, entertainment and conventions (ILEC) segments.

‘For offices, CapitaLand is looking to build Capital Tower equivalents as well as Raffles City developments in Vietnam, provided there are available sites of significant size,’ the company said in a statement. (story)

Singapore and Malaysia cooperate on education, officially

Malaysia and Singapore Tuesday formalised their cooperation in the education field after realising recently that their past collaborations were done without official stamp.

Malaysian Education Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Tun Hussein said he was shocked to discover that for many years education activities and exchanges between the two countries were conducted informally.

He was speaking at the opening of the Malaysia-Singapore Business Forum here prior to signing the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Educational Cooperation between the Education Ministries of Malaysia and Singapore at the forum venue.

His Singaporean counterpart who is also the Finance Minister, Tharman Shanmugaratnam, inked the MoU on behalf of the Singapore Education Ministry.

Speaking to reporters later, Hishammuddin said he discovered the matter about six months ago but with the good understanding and his personal rapport with Tharman, and Singapore’s government sincerity, the memorandum with all the details was readied in a very short time.

Under the cooperation, both sides will, among others, carry out exchange programmes involving ministry officials, school principals and students from both sides, teaching of the English language and inculcating good values among the students which will go a long way towards constructing a platform for even healthier bilateral relations in the future. (story)