New York - The world is well prepared to beat back any major influenza pandemic with 148 countries having made contingency plans to deal with the disease, the United Nations and the World Bank said Tuesday.

"Considering that pandemic preparedness was largely unaddressed by the world's nations three years ago, the widespread awareness and action seen today is a major achievement," said David Nabarro, the UN system influenza coordinator.

New York - Pfizer Inc, the world's largest drug maker, said Tuesday that its quarterly earnings tripled on one-time items despite flat revenues.

Earnings rose to 2.28 billion dollars, or 34 cents a share, on job cuts and a favourable exchange rate, up from 761 million dollars, or 11 cents, in the year-earlier period when it was hit by a one-time charge for dropping an insulin drug, the company said in New York. Excluding one-time costs, profits rose 5 per cent.

New York, Oct 21: Russia has reportedly rejected Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s request for donations for poll campaign, saying the country does not finance political acts in foreign countries.

McCain has requested Russian Federation’s United Nations mission in New York in writing to fund his poll campaign. But, in a terse response to the solicitation of money, the Russian mission said: “We do not finance political activity in foreign countries.”

New York, Oct. 21: A New York Times analysis of donors who have handed over cheques of 25,000 dollars or more to the fund-raising committees of the Obama and McCain campaigns, has found that most of it came from the securities and investments industry.

According to the paper, the contributions have come from various firms embroiled in the recent financial crisis like Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers and AIG, and it adds that the joint fund-raising committees have been utilized far more heavily in this presidential election than in the past.

New York, Oct. 21: Fifty three percent of American voters claim that Illinois Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has far greater appeal than his Republican rival John McCain.

However, according to a New York Times report, 33 percent say they have an unfavorable view of Obama.

As far as McCain is concerned, only 36 percent of the voters view him favorably, while 45 percent view him unfavorably.

New York, Oct. 21 : Democratic presidential nominee and White House frontrunner Barack Obama has announced that he will suspend his campaigning for 36 hours to visit his ailing grandmother Madelyn Dunham in Hawaii.

According to the New York Times, Dunham, 85, is gravely ill. Campaign spokesman Robert Gibbs declined to specify the nature of her illness, other than to say it was quite serious. Dunham lives in Honolulu.