Coins DIG

Over the last few years, Nintendo has discovered a whole new market for video games: seniors. Not a demographic that's known for welcoming new technology, the senior-citizen crowd has nonetheless embraced the Wii console, with its intuitive controls and easy-to-understand interface.

Nintendo's new portable system, the DSi XL, could find a place on the coffee table next to grandma's Wii remote. Think of it as the electronic equivalent of a large-print novel: You get the same content you would on a DSi, but everything's bigger and easier to read.

The XL isn't just for seniors, though. As a game reviewer, I often spend hours gazing at the DSi. (Don't try this at home.) The 3.25-inch diagonal screens on the previous model have led to lots of squinting — and some fierce headaches. The 4.2-inch screens on the XL let me relax my eyeballs a little more.

A Food and Drug Administration advisory panel recommended Thursday that the agency consider actions such as requiring that teenagers get parental consent before using a tanning bed or even banning the use of tanning beds among teens. The advisers also recommended reclassifying tanning lamps from Class I medical devices — a category that includes tongue depressors and elastic bandages — to a Class II or Class III device, which would permit the agency to impose greater restrictions.

President Barack Obama's sweeping health care legislation won precious support from a longtime liberal holdout in the House on Wednesday and from a retired Catholic bishop and nuns representing dozens of religious orders — gaining fresh traction ahead of a climactic weekend vote.

"That's a good sign," said Obama, two weeks after taking personal command of a campaign to enact legislation in what has become a virtual vote of confidence on his still-young presidency.

But Democrats delayed the planned release of formal legislation at least until Thursday as they sought to make sure it would reduce federal deficits annually over the next decade.

At the White House, Obama met with Richard Trumka, the head of the AFL-CIO. Officials said the labor leader raised concerns over the details of a planned excise tax on high-cost insurance plans as well as other elements of the as-yet-unreleased legislation.

I left GDC this year with a lot of uneasiness about the state of gaming on Windows 7 phones. The selling point for me was the synergy the phones would share with Xbox Live, though the sessions and conversations about Windows phones as a development platform worried me, as it became obvious that gaming experiences would not be identical between platforms despite the services sharing a Live backend. On one hand, you've got to develop to each platform's strengths, but if I earn Achievements, I want it to be for things that I can do on my Xbox 360.

The dead fish smell of a popular diabetes drug may cause some people to discontinue its use.

Metformin, an oral drug commonly used to treat type 2 diabetes, generally has few serious side effects, but gastrointestinal upset and nausea are common. Although these effects have been well documented in studies, researchers say one unique characteristic of the pills may have been overlooked as a potential cause of the nausea: their strong fishy odor.

Researchers say adverse reactions to the smell of metformin (sold generically and under the brand name Glucophage), have not been documented in medical literature, but hundreds of postings to message boards on the Internet note the strong fishy smell of the drug.

The debate over making cervical cancer vaccines available to young women is coming to the state Legislature today.

A group of anti-vaccine activists plans to attend this morning's Senate Codes Committee hearing to protest a bill that would let health care professionals give the vaccine to women younger than 18 without parental consent.

The measure, sponsored in the Senate by Liz Krueger and in the Assembly by Amy Paulin -- both Democrats -- aims to protect women against preventable cervical cancer. The legislation also notes that Planned Parenthood clinics have been seeing teenagers coming in and requesting the vaccine.

Krueger said such vaccines have a proven track record. "It has a direct correlation to preventing cancer," she said, adding the legislation wouldn't make such vaccines mandatory.

The virus first struck last spring and returned in the fall. "We still don't know whether there will be a third wave," said health department spokesman John Ricci.

Nintendo Co. said year-end holiday sales were "robust," suggesting that its Wii game console had regained its footing after a slowdown in demand, though a strong yen and price cuts continued to push down the company's profits.

Nintendo said group net income was 192.60 billion yen ($2.14 billion) for the nine months ended Dec. 31, down 9% from a profit of 212.52 billion yen for April-December of the previous year. Revenue fell 23% to 1.182 trillion yen, while operating profit fell 41% to 296.66 billion yen.

The research, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, questions the wisdom of raising co-payments to save money, at least among the elderly.

That might be a way to cut health care costs among younger people, but not for people age 65 and older, Dr. Amal Trivedi of Brown University, who led the study, said in a telephone interview.

"It's a lose-lose proposition for most health plans," Trivedi said.