Historic old Jeddah awaits life-saving restoration

JEDDAH, Saudi Arabia (Reuters) - In the heart of Saudi Arabia's sprawling Red Sea port city of Jeddah, centuries-old buildings tilt and buckle above the historic district's narrow alleys, withering away in the absence of decisive action to protect them.

The seventh-century historic district, with its mud and coral town houses adorned with ornate wooden balconies, holds the only remnants of the traditional architecture of the Hijaz, as the western Arabian Peninsula is known.

But while Jeddah is building the world's tallest tower as part of a modernization drive, efforts to preserve its oldest area are faltering.

"Every time I walk and see these houses it hurts," said Abir AbuSulayman, who lives in the modern part of Jeddah but lobbies for the restoration of the old city.

"I wasn't born here or ever lived in the area but I can feel how important it is and I feel proud that we have real history."

Restoration efforts have been left largely in private hands because Saudi authorities cannot by law intervene to renovate the privately owned homes in the district. Locals say the government has not shown enough interest in resolving the problem, or in breaking a logjam in financing the improvement of the area's public infrastructure.

As a result, a quarter of the houses in the district's square kilometer have collapsed, burnt down or been demolished in the past decade because home-owners cannot afford costly renovations and have little interest or incentive to do so.

Houses where the wealthiest Jeddah merchants once lived are now cheap dwellings for poor foreign laborers, beggars and illegal immigrants. Of the historic district's estimated 40,000 inhabitants, fewer than 5 percent are Saudis, the district's mayor Malak Baissa estimated.

Webs of intertwined cables cascade down the houses' dilapidated facades while satellite dishes hang from their cracked walls and rusty air conditioners protrude from their rotting wooden balconies.

A previous effort to list the historic area as a UNESCO world heritage site, which officials say would jumpstart restoration work, failed in part because there was no realistic master plan.

The government plans to resubmit its application to UNESCO this month, and this time has included proposals to encourage home-owners to restore their properties under expert guidance with loans and other financial incentives, as is the practice in some other countries with huge restoration projects.

"We are very optimistic that once it is registered everybody will come forward and be enthusiastic about (the restoration)," said Abdulgader Amir, the municipality's vice mayor for strategic planning.

CONSTANT MAINTENANCE

Jeddah's humid climate rots the houses' wood and erodes their walls, meaning they require constant maintenance. Local laws stipulate that this be done with mud and coral limestone drawn from the Red Sea, using costly traditional building techniques.

"The house will deteriorate if there is no one to take care of it. Like an old garment, if you don't patch it up it will disintegrate," said Younis al-Jazar, among the few Saudi citizens who still live in the area, where he was born and raised.

Costs of restoration vary depending on the size and extent of damage to a house, but can range from 50,000 riyals ($13,000) to over 3 million. Jazar said regular maintenance on his family home costs at least 6,000 riyals a year.

The local property market further discourages restoration efforts: new buildings in the area can command rents of 50,000 riyals a year compared with 2,400 for old houses.

"They (owners) know they are sitting on a very valuable land in the city center. They want to get rid of the old houses to build new structures," Amir said.

Of 600 old houses counted a decade ago only 450 remain.

Although the central government has instructed the city to spend $53 million to help restore the public parts of the district, the money must come from the city's own coffers, Amir said.

This is something that Jeddah, where creaking infrastructure contributed to deadly floods in 2010 and 2011, and which is completely overhauling its transport networks, cannot now afford.

"We can barely cover costs, so it's like giving something but it is not real... But we will keep asking for it," he said.

The government has bought and restored some properties in the area, including a 13th-century mosque and the house where Saudi founder Abdul Aziz al Saud lived when in Jeddah, but officials say it would be too expensive to purchase more buildings so they are now planning to provide state loans.

FRUSTRATION

Adhering to an austere version of Sunni Islam which prohibits the veneration of objects, Saudi Arabia has until recently neglected and even destroyed many of its historic sites such as homes and tombs of iconic Islamic figures in the holy cities of Mecca and Medina.

It has now listed two sites, the Nabatean rock-dwellings of Madain Saleh and the ruling al-Saud family's historical capital of Diriyah, with UNESCO and is working hard to protect its heritage there.

"Here in the kingdom there was a lack of awareness and appreciation for heritage and we have, in ignorance, destroyed many sites including Old Riyadh ... but thank goodness we have passed that stage," said Ali al-Ghabban, the Vice-President of Antiquities and Museums at the Supreme Commission for Tourism and Antiquities, a government department.

Some Jeddah citizens and other people from Hijaz, which includes Mecca, Medina and the old port town of Yanbu, accuse the government of playing regional favorites, stirring old resentments dating to the al-Saud's conquest of Hijaz in 1923.

They point to the investment of at least $133 million in preserving Diriyah and compare it unfavorably with the continuing neglect of cultural sites in their cities.

Amir defended the central government's priorities, however.

"Anything historical that has to do with the government and its establishment is naturally important ... that does not mean that Jeddah is neglected. But it was just a lot easier to deal with Diriyah considering no one lives there, it is much smaller than Jeddah and the government owns the whole area," he said.

As the authorities consider how to proceed with restoration of the historic district, Jeddah residents like AbuSulayman continue to lobby for swifter action and monitor the development in the area as best as they can.

"We don't have the power to make decisions but we are here," she said. "We need help ... (and) we are willing to do more."

(Editing by Angus McDowall and Sonya Hepinstall)

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Malaysian opposition to rally for poll reforms

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia's opposition on Wednesday received rare permission to hold a weekend political rally in a historic stadium, ahead of hotly anticipated elections due within months.

Opposition organisers say the gathering on Saturday at the 30,000-seater Stadium Merdeka (Independence Stadium), in the capital Kuala Lumpur, will focus on continued widespread criticism of a voting system seen as skewed in favour of the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition.

Senior opposition politician, Hatta Ramli, from the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party said: "Not giving access to the stadium would have looked very bad for the government... They are doing the right thing and now we have a proper venue for the gathering. We want to make people aware of our demands for free and fair elections."

A rally for clean elections in April drew tens of thousands to the streets but degenerated into clashes between demonstrators and police, who were criticised for a response widely seen as heavy-handed.

The ruling coalition has controlled Malaysia since independence in 1957 but political observers say it faces its stiffest test yet in the coming polls against a formidable opposition and amid rising voter impatience with its rule.

Prime Minister Najib Razak must face elections no later than late June, but speculation of early polls is rife.

Najib's ethnic Malay-dominated ruling bloc faces an alliance comprising opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim's multi-ethnic party, the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party and a third party dominated by ethnic Chinese.

Malays make up more than 60 per cent of Malaysia's 28 million people.

The trust that owns the stadium, where independence was declared 56 years ago, said in a statement it would allow Saturday's rally but that crowds must not exceed the venue's capacity.

The opposition often complains of hurdles in gaining permission for rallies, blaming ruling-party meddling, and had said in recent days that the stadium trust appeared to be snubbing its request, before approval came through.

Activists and the opposition say Malaysia's electoral roll is marred with irregularities, and complain that election officials and mainstream media are biased in favour of the ruling coalition.

The government set up a parliamentary panel to examine the complaints but critics said not enough concrete action has been taken.

The last elections in 2008 saw Barisan Nasional's worst showing ever, losing its traditional two-thirds parliamentary majority to the opposition.

- AFP/xq

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Rail fares hiked across the board, opposition demands immediate rollback

NEW DELHI: In a rare decision just a month ahead of the Union budget, railway minister Pawan Kumar Bansal on Wednesday effected an across-the-board hike in fares of all classes from midnight of January 21 to net an additional Rs 6,600 crore a year, the first such increase in a decade.

The proposals will rake in an additional Rs 1200 crore between January 21 and March 31 this year, the minister said announcing the decision and did not rule out a hike in the freight tariff.

Fares of Ordinary Second Class (suburban) trains will go up by 2 paise per km while for non-suburban travel it will be 3 paise.

Travel by Second Class Mail and Express trains will be costlier by 4 paise per km, while it will be 6 paise in Sleeper Class.

Travellers by AC Chair Car and AC Three Tier will have to shell out 10 paise more per km, First Class by 3 paise, AC Two Tier by 6 paise and AC First Class by 10 paise.

The fares for First Class, AC Two Tier and AC First/ Executive Class were already raised by 10 paise per km, 15 and 30 paise respectively in the current year's budget.

Breaking away from the populism of his predecessors, including Lalu Prasad and Mamata Banerjee, Bansal, who was made the railway minister in October last, told a press conference that the decision to hike the fares was "imperative" as lack of revision in the last 10 years has had a "telling effect" on the railway finances.

Dinesh Trivedi, who succeeded his party chief Banerjee, made a bold decision to hike fares in the Budget in February, 2012 to mop up an additional Rs 4000 crore but paid the price when he was made to resign by his party Trinamool Congress which was opposed to it.

Today's decision also covered services like Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duronto type trains. However, it exempted platform tickets from any hike.

Bansal also proposed to do away with the practice of levying development charge on passenger tickets and all the chargeable fares will in future be in multiples of five.

As a result of the proposed hike, ordinary Second Class suburban fares for a distance of 35 km will go up by Rs 2 from Rs 8 to Rs 10, while in the non-suburban trains it will go up by Rs 5 for an average distance of 135 km.

In Sleeper Class, the increase would mean a hike of Rs 50 for a distance of 770 km from Rs 270 to Rs 320. In the case of AC Chair Car, for a distance of 387 km, the increase would be Rs 40 from Rs 345 to Rs 385.

In the case of AC Three Tier, for a distance of 717 km, the fare will go up from Rs 724 to Rs 800, an increase of Rs 76.

Similarly, in the case of AC Two Tier, the increase would mean a hike of Rs 48 for a distance of 721 km, while for AC First Class it will be Rs 56 for a distance of 547 km.

Replying to questions, Bansal said the railway budget next month will not propose any fresh hike in passenger fares.

But when asked whether there would be hike in the freight tariff, he was non committal. "I am not saying anything either way. We are not saying anything now."

Giving reasons for the decision which he described as reasonable, the minister said the losses in passenger segment, which was Rs 1,059 crore in 2004-05, rose to Rs 19,964 crore in 2010-11, an increase of 18 per cent a year. This is likely to go up to Rs 25,000 crore in the current fiscal.

Bansal said input costs have increased immensely over the years and the fares had remained stagnant or there was a little decrease in the lower class fares.

He said railways was making efforts to raise revenues to meet urgent safety and user amenities requirements.

In addition, the Sixth Pay Commission meant an additional outgo of Rs 73,000 crore in the five year period and about one lakh crore till this time.

Bansal also said the freight traffic target could also not be met with the load showing a shortfall of 13 million tonne till December end.

He cross subsidy through freight business was no more viable in view of the fast evolving competition from other modes.

The across-the-board fare hike proposal of Dwivedi in the current year's budget was finally approved only for First Class, Second AC and First AC/ Executive Classes, which together constitute only about 0.3 per cent of total passengers and about 10 per cent of total earnings from passenger segment.

He said internal resource generation has been seriously impacted resulting in scaling down of Annual Plan size. Fund balances turned negative in 2011-12, adversely affecting essential replacement and renewal of assets, operation and maintenance activities and critical safety and passenger amenity works.

Rail fare hike unacceptable, unfortunate: Opposition

The BJP, Left parties and Trinamool Congress on Wednesday slammed the government for the hike in passenger rail fares and demanded its immediate rollback.

They termed the decision as "anti-people", saying it will further hit the common man already reeling under price rise and inflation.

The parties said instead of raising fares, Railways should have adopted other means to garner additional revenue.

The BJP said the decision to increase rail fares a few weeks ahead of the Budget Session of Parliament clearly exposes the "anti-democratic" face of the UPA government.

"The near 20 percent hike in fares has dealt a big blow to the common man who is already reeling under high inflation," he said, demanding a roll back of the hiked fares.

Terming the decision of rail fare hike as 'unjustified', the CPM politburo demanded a rollback for non-AC travel.

The party also hit out at railway minister Pawan Bansal for showing "contempt" for Parliament by announcing the fare hike "just a month before the Railway Budget is to be placed in Parliament."

The CPM politburo said the hike in the fares of second class, sleeper and suburban fares was "particularly unjustified as they will burden the ordinary people who are already suffering from all-round price rise."

Trinamool Congress, a former ally of the Congress-led UPA government which held the railway ministry before moving out of the alliance, also termed the hike as "anti-people" and "unfortunate" and said its announcement before the budget "bypassed" Parliament.

The Congress, however, endorsed the sudden decision to hike railway fare saying it was "inevitable".

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Report: Death rates from cancer still inching down

WASHINGTON (AP) — Death rates from cancer are continuing to inch down, researchers reported Monday.

Now the question is how to hold onto those gains, and do even better, even as the population gets older and fatter, both risks for developing cancer.

"There has been clear progress," said Dr. Otis Brawley of the American Cancer Society, which compiled the annual cancer report with government and cancer advocacy groups.

But bad diets, lack of physical activity and obesity together wield "incredible forces against this decline in mortality," Brawley said. He warned that over the next decade, that trio could surpass tobacco as the leading cause of cancer in the U.S.

Overall, deaths from cancer began slowly dropping in the 1990s, and Monday's report shows the trend holding. Among men, cancer death rates dropped by 1.8 percent a year between 2000 and 2009, and by 1.4 percent a year among women. The drops are thanks mostly to gains against some of the leading types — lung, colorectal, breast and prostate cancers — because of treatment advances and better screening.

The news isn't all good. Deaths still are rising for certain cancer types including liver, pancreatic and, among men, melanoma, the most serious kind of skin cancer.

Preventing cancer is better than treating it, but when it comes to new cases of cancer, the picture is more complicated.

Cancer incidence is dropping slightly among men, by just over half a percent a year, said the report published by the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Prostate, lung and colorectal cancers all saw declines.

But for women, earlier drops have leveled off, the report found. That may be due in part to breast cancer. There were decreases in new breast cancer cases about a decade ago, as many women quit using hormone therapy after menopause. Since then, overall breast cancer incidence has plateaued, and rates have increased among black women.

Another problem area: Oral and anal cancers caused by HPV, the sexually transmitted human papillomavirus, are on the rise among both genders. HPV is better known for causing cervical cancer, and a protective vaccine is available. Government figures show just 32 percent of teen girls have received all three doses, fewer than in Canada, Britain and Australia. The vaccine was recommended for U.S. boys about a year ago.

Among children, overall cancer death rates are dropping by 1.8 percent a year, but incidence is continuing to increase by just over half a percent a year. Brawley said it's not clear why.

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Giffords, Kelly Say 'Enough' to Gun Violence

After she was gravely wounded by gunfire two years ago in Tucson, Ariz., former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and her husband, Mark Kelly, imagined a life out of the public eye, where she would continue therapy surrounded by the friends, family and the Arizona desert she loves so much.

Gabby Giffords and Mark Kelly Speak Exclusively to Diane Sawyer

But after the slaughter of 20 first-graders and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., last month, Giffords and Kelly knew they couldn't stay silent.

"Enough," Giffords said.

The couple marked the second anniversary of the Tucson shooting by sitting down with Diane Sawyer to discuss their recent visit to Newtown and their new initiative to curb gun violence, "Americans for Responsible Solutions."

"After the shooting in Tucson, there was talk about addressing some of these issues, [and] again after [a movie theater massacre in] Aurora," Colo., Kelly said. "I'm hopeful that this time is different, and I think it is. Twenty first-graders' being murdered in their classrooms is a very personal thing for everybody."

Rep. Gabby Giffords on Meeting Newtown, Conn. Shooting Victims Watch Video

Gabby Giffords and Mark Kelly Speak Exclusively to Diane Sawyer Watch Video

Gabrielle Giffords: Pledge of Allegiance at DNC Watch Video

Full Coverage: Gabrielle Giffords

During their trip to Newtown, Giffords and Kelly met with families directly affected by the tragedy.

"[The] first couple that we spoke to, the dad took out his cell phone and showed us a picture of his daughter and I just about lost it, just by looking at the picture," Kelly said. "It was just very tough and it brought back a lot of memories about what that was like for us some two years ago."

Full Coverage: Tragedy in Newtown

"Strength," Giffords said she told the families in Newtown.

"Gabby often told them, 'You got to have strength. You got to fight for something,'" Kelly said.

The innocent faces of the children whose lives were abruptly taken reminded the couple, they said, of 9-year-old Christina-Taylor Green, the youngest victim to die in the Tucson shooting at a Giffords constituent event.

"I think we all need to try to do something about [gun violence]," Kelly said. "It's obvious to everybody we have a problem. And problems can be solved."

Giffords, Kelly Call for 'Common Sense' Solutions

Giffords, 42, and Kelly, 48, are both gun owners and supporters of the 2nd Amendment, but Kelly had strong words for the National Rifle Association after the group suggested the only way to stop gun violence is to have a "good guy with a gun."

There was a good guy with a gun, Kelly said, the day Jared Loughner shot Giffords and 18 other people, six fatally, at her "Congress on Your Corner" event.

"[A man came out] of the store next door and nearly shot the man who took down Jared Loughner," Kelly said. "The one who eventually wrestled [Loughner] to the ground was almost killed himself by a good guy with a gun, so I don't really buy that argument."

Instead, Giffords and Kelly are proposing "common sense" changes through "Americans for Responsible Solutions."

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Tunisia frees man held over attack on U.S. consulate in Libya

Tunis (Reuters) - Tunisia has freed, for lack of evidence, a Tunisian man who had been suspected of involvement in an Islamist militant attack in Libya last year in which the U.S. ambassador was killed, his lawyer said on Tuesday.

Ali Harzi was one of two Tunisians named in October by the Daily Beast website as having been detained in Turkey over the violence in which Christopher Stevens, the U.S. ambassador to Libya, and three other American officials were killed.

"The judge decided to free Harzi and he is free now," lawyer Anouar Awled Ali told Reuters. "The release came in response to our request to free him for lack of evidence and after he underwent the hearing with American investigators as a witness in the case."

A Tunisian justice ministry spokesman confirmed the release of Harzi but declined to elaborate.

A month ago, Harzi refused to be interviewed by visiting U.S. FBI investigators over the September 11 assault on the U.S. consulate in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi.

The Daily Beast reported that shortly after the attacks began, Harzi posted an update on an unspecified social media site about the fighting.

It said Harzi was on his way to Syria when he was detained in Turkey at the behest of U.S. authorities, and that he was affiliated with a militant group in North Africa.

(Reporting by Tarek Amara; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

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India says two soldiers killed in clash with Pakistan troops

SRINAGAR, India: Pakistani troops killed two Indian soldiers on Tuesday near the tense disputed border between the nuclear-armed neighbours in Kashmir and one of the bodies was badly mutilated, the Indian army said.

The firefight broke out at about noon on Tuesday (0630 GMT) after an Indian patrol discovered Pakistani troops about half a kilometre (1,600 feet) inside Indian territory, an army spokesman told AFP.

A ceasefire has been in place along the Line of Control that divides the countries since 2003, but it is periodically violated by both sides and Pakistan said Indian troops killed a Pakistani soldier on Sunday.

Relations had been slowly improving over the last few years following a rupture in their slow-moving peace process after the 2008 attacks on Mumbai, which were blamed by India on Pakistan-based militants.

"There was a firefight with Pakistani troops," army spokesman Rajesh Kalia told AFP from the mountainous Himalayan region.

"We lost two soldiers and one of them has been badly mutilated," he added, declining to give more details on the injuries.

"The intruders were regular (Pakistani) soldiers and they were 400-500 metres (1,300-1,600 feet) inside our territory," he said of the clash in Mendhar sector, 173 kilometres (107 miles) west by road from the city of Jammu.

In Islamabad, a Pakistan military spokesman denied what he called an "Indian allegation of unprovoked firing". He declined to elaborate.

On Sunday, Pakistan said Indian troops had crossed the Line of Control and stormed a military post. It said one Pakistani soldier was killed and another injured.

It lodged a formal protest with India on Monday over what it called an unprovoked attack.

India denied crossing the line, saying it had retaliated with small arms fire after Pakistani mortars hit a village home.

A foreign ministry spokesman said Indian troops had undertaken "controlled retaliation" on Sunday after "unprovoked firing" which damaged a civilian home.

The deaths are set to undermine recent efforts to improve relations, such as opening up trade and offering more lenient visa regimes which have been a feature of talks between senior political leaders from both sides.

Muslim-majority Kashmir is a Himalayan region which India and Pakistan both claim in full but rule in part. It was the cause of two of three wars between the neighbours since independence from Britain in 1947.

- AFP/fa

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SP leader Abu Azmi endorses RSS chief, says western culture to blame for rapes

MUMBAI: Samajwadi Party leader Abu Asim Azmi said on Tuesday that western culture had ruined Indian culture and led to increasing atrocities on women including rapes.

"Young girls and women must not roam around with any men except their parents, brothers or husband," Azmi said here.

"Having boyfriends and girlfriends has become a fashion in cities. This is why incidence of rapes is higher in urban areas compared to rural parts of the country," he added.

Azmi endorsed RSS leader Mohan Bhagwat, who last week expressed similar sentiments.

Asked if he supported the RSS chief's views, Azmi said: "When he is saying is something right. I cannot say he is wrong.

"If he calls the sun the sun or the moon the moon, I cannot say he is wrong just because of our political differences."

Saying that "we are all proud of our Indian culture and values", Azmi added that women in Rajasthan were always veiled. But when young women go out skimpily dressed, they attract attention and face risks.

"Such nudity must be banned. The censor board must not clear movies having explicit scenes which embarrass families watching them together.

"Women from rural India with knowledge of Indian culture must be inducted into the censor board," Azmi said.

Azmi felt that capital punishment for rape could be "misused by girls and innocent men could be hanged".

"Even if there is a consensual relationship and it turns sour later, girls could resort to blackmail and men would still be punished."

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Your medical chart could include exercise minutes

CHICAGO (AP) — Roll up a sleeve for the blood pressure cuff. Stick out a wrist for the pulse-taking. Lift your tongue for the thermometer. Report how many minutes you are active or getting exercise.

Wait, what?

If the last item isn't part of the usual drill at your doctor's office, a movement is afoot to change that. One recent national survey indicated only a third of Americans said their doctors asked about or prescribed physical activity.

Kaiser Permanente, one of the nation's largest nonprofit health insurance plans, made a big push a few years ago to get its southern California doctors to ask patients about exercise. Since then, Kaiser has expanded the program across California and to several other states. Now almost 9 million patients are asked at every visit, and some other medical systems are doing it, too.

Here's how it works: During any routine check of vital signs, a nurse or medical assistant asks how many days a week the patient exercises and for how long. The number of minutes per week is posted along with other vitals at the top the medical chart. So it's among the first things the doctor sees.

"All we ask our physicians to do is to make a comment on it, like, 'Hey, good job,' or 'I noticed today that your blood pressure is too high and you're not doing any exercise. There's a connection there. We really need to start you walking 30 minutes a day,'" said Dr. Robert Sallis, a Kaiser family doctor. He hatched the vital sign idea as part of a larger initiative by doctors groups.

He said Kaiser doctors generally prescribe exercise first, instead of medication, and for many patients who follow through that's often all it takes.

It's a challenge to make progress. A study looking at the first year of Kaiser's effort showed more than a third of patients said they never exercise.

Sallis said some patients may not be aware that research shows physical inactivity is riskier than high blood pressure, obesity and other health risks people know they should avoid. As recently as November a government-led study concluded that people who routinely exercise live longer than others, even if they're overweight.

Zendi Solano, who works for Kaiser as a research assistant in Pasadena, Calif., says she always knew exercise was a good thing. But until about a year ago, when her Kaiser doctor started routinely measuring it, she "really didn't take it seriously."

She was obese, and in a family of diabetics, had elevated blood sugar. She sometimes did push-ups and other strength training but not anything very sustained or strenuous.

Solano, 34, decided to take up running and after a couple of months she was doing three miles. Then she began training for a half marathon — and ran that 13-mile race in May in less than three hours. She formed a running club with co-workers and now runs several miles a week. She also started eating smaller portions and buying more fruits and vegetables.

She is still overweight but has lost 30 pounds and her blood sugar is normal.

Her doctor praised the improvement at her last physical in June and Solano says the routine exercise checks are "a great reminder."

Kaiser began the program about three years ago after 2008 government guidelines recommended at least 2 1/2 hours of moderately vigorous exercise each week. That includes brisk walking, cycling, lawn-mowing — anything that gets you breathing a little harder than normal for at least 10 minutes at a time.

A recently published study of nearly 2 million people in Kaiser's southern California network found that less than a third met physical activity guidelines during the program's first year ending in March 2011. That's worse than results from national studies. But promoters of the vital signs effort think Kaiser's numbers are more realistic because people are more likely to tell their own doctors the truth.

Dr. Elizabeth Joy of Salt Lake City has created a nearly identical program and she expects 300 physicians in her Intermountain Healthcare network to be involved early this year.

"There are some real opportunities there to kind of shift patients' expectations about the value of physical activity on health," Joy said.

NorthShore University HealthSystem in Chicago's northern suburbs plans to start an exercise vital sign program this month, eventually involving about 200 primary care doctors.

Dr. Carrie Jaworski, a NorthShore family and sports medicine specialist, already asks patients about exercise. She said some of her diabetic patients have been able to cut back on their medicines after getting active.

Dr. William Dietz, an obesity expert who retired last year from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said measuring a patient's exercise regardless of method is essential, but that "naming it as a vital sign kind of elevates it."

Figuring out how to get people to be more active is the important next step, he said, and could have a big effect in reducing medical costs.

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Online:

Exercise: http://1.usa.gov/b6AkMa

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AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner

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Hagel Nomination Stirs Bipartisan Opposition

Two weeks before his inauguration, and with more "fiscal cliffs" on the horizon, President Obama is embracing a showdown with Congress over his pick to lead the Pentagon in his second term.

Obama will nominate former Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel to be the next Secretary of Defense at a formal White House announcement later today, administration officials said.

The president will name counterterrorism advisor John Brennan as the new CIA director to replace David Petraeus, rounding out an overhaul of his national security team.

Obama tapped Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts last month to become the next Secretary of State.

Hagel is in many ways an ideal pick for Obama, giving nod to bipartisanship while appointing someone with a demonstrated commitment to veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan and to retooling and economizing the Pentagon bureaucracy for the future.

But the nomination of Hagel to replace outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is also politically charged, expected to trigger a brutal confirmation fight in the Senate, where a bipartisan group of critics has already lined up against the pick.

"This is an in your face nomination by the president to all of us who are supportive of Israel," Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., told CNN on Sunday. "I don't know what his management experience is regarding the Pentagon -- little, if any, so I think it's an incredibly controversial choice."

Obama's Defense Nominee Chuck Hagel Stirs Washington Lawmakers Watch Video

The criticism stems from Hagel's controversial past statements on foreign policy, including a 2008 reference to Israel's U.S. supporters as "the Jewish lobby" and public encouragement of negotiations between the United States, Israel and Hamas, a Palestinian group the State Department classifies as terrorists.

"Hagel has consistently been against economic sanctions to try to change the behavior of the Islamist regime, the radical regime in Tehran, which is the only way to do it, short of war," Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., said last month.

The Nebraska Republican has also drawn fire for his outspoken opposition to the 2003 U.S.-led war in Iraq and the subsequent troop "surge" ordered by then-President George W. Bush in 2007, which has been credited with helping bring the war to a close.

On the left, gay rights groups have protested Hagel for comments he made in 1998 disparaging then-President Bill Clinton's nominee for U.S. Ambassador to Luxembourg James Hormel as "openly, aggressively gay." Hagel has since apologized for the remark as "insensitive."

Top Senate Democrats tell ABC News there is no guarantee Hagel will win confirmation and that, as of right now, there are enough Democratic Senators with serious concerns about Hagel to put him below 50 votes.

But that could change, with many top lawmakers publicly vowing to withhold final judgment until Hagel has an opportunity to answer his critics during confirmation hearings. No senator has yet publicly vowed to filibuster the Hagel nomination.

Hagel is a decorated Vietnam veteran and businessman who served in the senate from 1997 to 2009. After having sat on that chamber's Foreign Relations and Intelligence committees, he has in recent years gathered praise from current and former diplomats for his work on Obama's Intelligence Advisory Board as well as the policy board of current Defense Secretary Leon Panetta.

"Chuck Hagel is a tremendous patriot and statesman, served incredibly in Vietnam, served this country as a United States senator. He hasn't had a chance to speak for himself. And so why all the prejudging?" said Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., on "This Week."

"In America, you give everybody a chance to speak for themselves and then we'll decide," she said.

The top Senate Republican echoed that sentiment. "I'm going to wait and see how the hearings go and see whether Chuck's views square with the job he would be nominated to do," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said.

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