Virginia

New astronaut group includes three teachers

NASA on Thursday introduced a new class of 11 astronauts, a group that includes three teachers who are giving up the classroom for the chance to fly into space.

The teachers, selected from a field of more than 1,000 applicants, will live, work and train with more than 100 other astronauts at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. The new astronauts could be scheduled for space flights by 2009.

No teacher has flown on a shuttle since Christa McAuliffe, who died in the 1986 Challenger explosion. The teacher who served as McAuliffe’s alternate on that flight, Barbara Morgan, has been training in Houston since 1998 and is scheduled for a 2006 space flight.

The introduction of the 11 astronauts comes as the space program is in flux, with shuttle missions grounded since Columbia disintegrated on re-entry last year. Shuttle flights will not resume until at least 2005, and the fleet will be permanently grounded in 2010 to redirect efforts for a return to the moon by 2020.

Boston

Church defrocks priest in sex scandal

Paul Shanley, a central figure in the child-molestation scandal that engulfed the Boston Archdiocese, has been defrocked, along with another priest imprisoned for raping a 12-year-old boy, the church announced Thursday.

In a letter dated May 3 and obtained by The Associated Press, Archbishop Sean O’Malley informed Shanley that Pope John Paul II decided Feb. 19 to remove him from the priesthood.

The archdiocese released a statement Thursday confirming Shanley’s dismissal, and announced that Ronald H. Paquin — who was sentenced in 2002 to 12 to 15 years behind bars for raping an altar boy — also was defrocked. Paquin, 61, also was named in 24 lawsuits alleging he sexually molested other children.

Shanley, 73, is awaiting trial on charges of raping four boys at a parish in Newton in the 1980s. He is free on $300,000 bail. His trial is set for October.

Defrocking is only applied in extreme cases of misconduct.

Atlanta

Lyme disease cases hit record in 2002

Lyme disease has climbed to its highest level on record in the United States, in part because of the building of more homes in the woods, the government reported Thursday.

During 2002, a total of 23,763 cases were reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — up 40 percent from the previous year.

Lyme disease bacteria are transmitted to humans by ticks that are carried by deer. The CDC attributed the rise in cases to growing populations of deer that support deer ticks, more homes being built in wooded areas, and better recognition and reporting of the disease.

The 2002 cases were mainly in the Northeast, mid-Atlantic and north-central states. Only Hawaii, Montana and Oklahoma reported no cases in 2002.

Washington, D.C.

VA plans to close three hospitals, build two

The Veterans Affairs Department will close hospitals in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Mississippi and build new ones in Nevada and Florida as part of much-anticipated restructuring plan, The Associated Press has learned.

The agency also will add or remove medical services at dozens of other facilities.

VA Secretary Anthony Principi also has endorsed building 156 community-based outpatient clinics by 2012, with an emphasis on serving rural areas. Local VA officials had sought 270 clinics.

Principi was to release the plan today in Las Vegas.

Under the plan, the VA expects to reduce costs for maintaining vacant space from $3.4 billion to $750 million by 2022, but projects spending $6 billion on new construction during that time.