Manufacturer of "Transformers" robot toys, Hasbro Inc., managed to rise by 7.5% in early trading, mainly on the back of posting fourth-quarter earnings that beat the average estimate pegged by analysts.

On Monday, Greek civil servants issued a warning that they could call for more strikes if the Socialist Government goes ahead with the unveiling of the strict austerity measures in order to cut its deficit and curb the rapidly growing public debt.

On Friday, five of the local dentists went an extra mile to ensure that children's smiles are brightened. Free dental services to uninsured kids were provided by these dentists under the Give Kids A Smile program.

The initiative was a significant part of the Children's Dental Health Month.

For the first ever time, Government programs for the coming year will account for over 50% of the entire US healthcare spending, as has been predicted by federal actuaries, mainly on the back of a weak economy pushing more and more people into Medicaid, all the while slowing the growth of private insurance.

Despite being faced with all-time high levels of red ink in the near future, Washington ended up spending $2.5 Million for census advertisements, by rolling these during the Super Bowl.

Health experts have been urging parents to try and curb the epidemic of childhood obesity by ensuring that some definite changes are made to the family's lifestyle, i. e., kids should be discouraged from spending too much time in front of the TV or the computer and should rather be encouraged to go out and indulge in some physical exercise.

Toyota is going to start the production again in the wake of temporary shutdowns at the automaker's Woodstock and Cambridge assembly plants. Human Resources Manager, Roy Winger, says Toyota will return to the full production today with the same compliment of staff.

Reducing its fourth-quarter loss to $2.3-million and Vitran Corporation increased its revenue by 7%. Its revenue rose to $165 million from $154.2 million of the last year, in the three months ended on December 31.

Niko Resources Limited has decided to buy Voyager Energy Limited which is private junior oil and Natural Gas Exploration Company and a partner in Niko's 2AB exploration block in Trinidad. 2AB Block is a shallow water exploration block which covers about 16,000 square kilometers off the coast of the country.

Vancouver International Airport was closed to takeoffs and landings for 20 minutes on January 31 at 1: 15 p. m. due to reports of an unknown "target of interest", as has been revealed by a Transport Canada incident report.