"State Veterans Homes Week is the perfect opportunity for members of the community to visit the homes, meet some of America's honored veterans and explore various volunteer programs," said Brig. Gen. (PA) Mike Gould, the state's deputy adjutant general for veterans affairs. "It's also a time to thank the staff and volunteers of these homes who provide selfless and exceptional care for these heroes each and every day."

Special activities throughout the week will include musical entertainment, games and tournaments, field trips to local attractions, Flag Day ceremonies, carnivals and picnics.

The six homes serve more than 1,500 eligible veterans and their spouses. They include the Delaware Valley Veterans Home in Philadelphia, the Gino J. Merli Veterans Center in Scranton, the Hollidaysburg Veterans Home in Hollidaysburg, the Pennsylvania Soldiers and Sailors Home in Erie, the Southeastern Veterans Center in Spring City, and the Southwestern Veterans Center in Pittsburgh.

For more information about veterans home eligibility or volunteer opportunities at a veterans home, visitor follow DMVA on Facebook ator Twitter at .

Media contact: Joan Nissley, 717-861-8720

SOURCE Pennsylvania Department of Military and Veterans Affairs

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Americans accustomed to immediate access to the newest technology may be shocked to find that is not the case when it comes to devices that treat ailing hearts.

U.S. approval requirements for cardiac devices are much more stringent than in Europe, where there is no centralized decision-making body. But a growing number of U.S. heart doctors feel the regulations are so demanding that patients are being denied access to beneficial therapies.

From 2006 to 2011, European regulators approved mid-to-high-risk medical devices, including heart devices, an average of four years ahead of the more conservative U.S. Food and Drug Administration, according to a report last year by Boston Consulting Group. The quicker road to market in Europe did not lead to a discernible increase in recalls or safety problems, according to BCG and the California Healthcare Institute, which conducted the study, and Eucomed, the European trade group.

"There is frustration among the U.S. investigators(researchers) and U.S. care providers around delayed access to certain interventions that appear to be a winner," said Dr. Patrick O'Gara, a cardiologist with Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

An example cited by several doctors is a replacement for diseased heart valves made by U.S. device maker Edwards Lifesciences. The Sapien transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) system is particularly suited for elderly and frail patients, since it can be put in place via a catheter threaded through an artery rather than replacing a valve by cracking open the chest for heart surgery.

"With this disease, if you wait two or three years, 60 or 80 percent of (patients) are dead. So not to have the most updated version of the device to treat more patients like this doesn't seem to be a particularly good idea," said Dr. Martin Leon, director of the Center for Interventional Vascular Therapy at Columbia University Medical Center in New York.

Heart disease remains the world's No. 1 killer. An estimated 500,000 Americans suffer from severely diseased heart valves, according to the American Heart Association. Many could be candidates for valve replacements.

The approval delays are also costing device makers, such as Edwards and Medtronic Inc, hundreds of millions of dollars in potential sales while they are being asked to help pay for U.S. healthcare reform through new taxes.

Dismay among heart doctors over delayed access to new devices gained momentum at this year's American College of Cardiology (ACC) meeting, which featured several U.S. clinical trials of devices long available in Europe.

One top researcher at the meeting called the United States "a Third World country" when it comes to availability of cutting-edge heart devices.

Only Edwards' original Sapien valve has U.S. approval - which it received in 2011, four years after Europe and elsewhere. European cardiologists have been using a next-generation version, which doctors find easier to maneuver into place and believe may cause less trauma to the artery, for three years.

That is why Leon, who is co-lead investigator of U.S. clinical trials for both the original Sapien heart valve and the smaller, newer Sapien XT, sends some patients to Europe for treatment if he believes them better suited for the sleeker XT.

Medtronic has a similar heart valve replacement awaiting U.S. approval that has been used in Europe since 2007.

Asked at the ACC meeting if he found the situation frustrating, Dr. Gary Mintz, chief medical officer of the Cardiovascular Research Foundation in New York, shot back: "You mean because Algeria had TAVR before the U.S.?"

"Even the FDA recognizes the problem, but they are answerable to Congress, not us," Mintz said.

FDA'S BID TO STREAMLINE

The FDA requires proof of efficacy as well as safety through carefully controlled, randomized clinical trials before approving products, and may ask for long-term follow-up data.

"We recognize that some of our regulatory requirements have been viewed as impediments compared to other parts of the world," said Andrew Farb, medical officer in the FDA's division of cardiovascular device evaluation.

The FDA is working on a new program to help streamline the path to U.S. approval that would involve the agency much earlier in device development - possibly discussing results with researchers after use in the first patient, according to Farb.

The agency expects to publish this year its "early feasibility study guidance," which it hopes will outline a path toward swifter reviews and approvals of devices in development in the United States, Farb said.

"When you're starting a new way of thinking, getting this really ramped up is a challenge, but we're hopeful," he said.

Some companies, eager for faster returns on their investments, have moved early-stage device trials overseas, since they know they are likely to be able to begin selling the products there years earlier. That has added to delays of U.S. trials and approvals, Farb and others said.

Enrolling patients in randomized U.S. trials mandated by the FDA is also being hampered by patient fear they would be put in a control group that did not get the new device, doctors said.

Farb said the FDA is concerned by such trends and is seeking ways to move early-stage human trials back to the United States.

EUROPE MAY SEEK TIGHTER CONTROLS

In Europe, device makers must prove a product's safety to the satisfaction of one of some 80 designated regulator bodies and show it functions as intended. Effectiveness is determined through post-approval surveillance as it is used in patients. Some European politicians view the system as too lax and have called for a model closer to the U.S.

"I think we need to meet somewhere in between," said Dr. David Holmes, a cardiologist at the Mayo Clinic and a past ACC president, of the two regulatory systems. He said Europe may need to tighten its regulations without necessarily adding years to its process.

One suggestion put forward by Eucomed - a device industry trade group that represents thousands of companies - and others would significantly cut the number of European regulators allowed to approve higher-risk devices.

U.S. doctors are actively looking for ways to address the issue. "We need a coalition of involved, thoughtful and balanced individuals who see things on both sides of the equation and look for every opportunity to shorten this time line," O'Gara said.

Holmes said such a coalition, including researchers, manufacturers and physician groups like ACC and the Society of Thoracic Surgeons, is looking to work more closely with the FDA on the issue. He said the group is compiling a database of all patients getting TAVR to enhance understanding of the procedure's long-term performance and aid the FDA in making decisions.

MILLIONS IN LOST SALES

The approval lag means companies are leaving money on the table when it comes to their newest devices.

Edwards' original Sapien sells for about $32,000 per patient and had U.S. sales of about $200 million in its first year on the market. Had it been available in the United States at the same time as Europe, the company could have rung up at least an additional $800 million in sales, said Joanne Wuensch, an analyst with BMO Capital Markets. "That assumes no growth, which is ridiculous, so that is an extraordinarily conservative number," she said.

Proving efficacy can be a lengthy process. St Jude Medical's Amplatzer Occluder device, used to close a tiny hole in the heart, is awaiting an FDA decision. The decisive U.S. trial, which was not deemed complete until a pre-specified number of patients suffered strokes or died, took eight years.

For other examples, see:

Eucomed is campaigning to keep in place the system that brings new products to those markets earlier.

"As you get physician experience developing, you also start immediately improving the product," said Eucomed CEO Serge Bernasconi. "That explains why by the time it gets to market in the U.S., often in Europe we are already on the second or third generation."

Edwards, which considers the original Sapien valve to be obsolete and manufactures it only for U.S. use, expects European approval for its third-generation version by the end of 2013.

Meanwhile, U.S. doctors still await its predecessor.

(Additional reporting by Debra Sherman; Editing by Michele Gershberg, Ed Tobin and Douglas Royalty)

I thought I was going to die, . I fell to the ground."

Doctors expect Sarah to make a full recovery, but the circumstances of the shooting are disturbingly familiar. Over the weekend, New York City witnessed 25 shootings, resulting in six fatalities. On Sunday alone, three people were killed and eight others wounded by gunfire from Brooklyn to the Bronx.

The rash of weekend shootings comes against a backdrop of major gun control efforts by both New York City and state officials. Mayor Michael Bloomberg has emerged as one of the nations strongest advocates for stricter firearm regulations, and has long touted the citys strict gun control rules as helping to bring about a significant drop in crime over the last decade. (The mayors office declined to comment on the weekends shootings.)

New York recently became the first state to pass major gun control legislation since the Dec. 14 shootings in Newtown, Conn. The bill that Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed into law in January both strengthens the states existing assault weapons ban and introduces new mental health regulations for potential gun owners.

None of that did much to help Sarah, a seventh-grader at Middle School 302 in the Bronx and one of three girls to be caught in the line of fire over the last few weeks.

On May 18, Daja Robinson, 14, was shot and killed on her way to a Sweet 16 party when a gunman fired off nine rounds into the side of a Queens bus.

Last Friday, 11-year-old Tayloni Mazyck was shot by a stray bullet outside her apartment in Brooklyns Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood when a teenage boy opened fire on rival gang members. Tayloni, who survived the gunshot, lost feeling in her legs and may never walk again.

We should have more gun control, Sarahs mother, Jacqueline Franco, told the Daily News. I wish they could just make guns extinct, period.

While the weekends heinous gun violence might suggest the ineffectiveness of such measures, this years numbers are notably better than the last. , the 440 shootings so far this year represent a 23 percent drop from the 574 victims in 2012.

And while some have described this weekends figures asthe Windy City still leads the Big Apple in gun violence. Chicago, a city with just one-third of New Yorks population, witnessed over 500 homicides last year compared with New Yorks 414. This weekend, Chicago saw 12 people wounded by shootings and one fatality.

But Acting Commissioner Danny Werfel declared he was "committed to restoring that trust." He said he has installed new leadership at the agency and is conducting a thorough review of what went wrong and how to fix it.

He promised the transparency that was lacking for several years as tea party groups complained about harassment by the IRS, only to be met with denials from the agency.

"We must have the trust of the American taxpayer. Unfortunately, that trust has been broken," Werfel told a House Appropriations subcommittee in his first public appearance since taking over the agency nearly two weeks ago. "The agency stands ready to confront the problems that occurred, hold accountable those who acted inappropriately, be open about what happened, and permanently fix these problems so that such missteps do not occur again."

"It has to start," Werfel added, "with a recognition that a trust has been violated."

Werfel testified at a difficult time for the agency. Criticized from inside and outside the government, Werfel went to Capitol Hill to ask for a big budget increase. President Barack Obama has requested a 9 percent increase in IRS spending for the budget year that starts in October, in part to help pay for the implementation of the new health care law.

House Republicans have voted 37 times to eliminate, defund or partly scale back the Affordable Care Act, and many are not eager to increase funding for an agency that will play a central role in enforcing compliance.

"We will have to think very carefully about how much money to provide to the IRS," said Rep. Ander Crenshaw, R-Fla., chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee on financial services and general government.

Werfel acknowledged that it would be a "mistake" to ask Congress for more money to address the agency's recently revealed problems. But, he added, the IRS is seeking additional money to enforce tax laws, improve taxpayer services and implement initiatives.

"I'm prepared to defend the increase that we're asking for," he said.

An inspector general's report last month said IRS agents improperly targeted conservative political groups for additional scrutiny when they applied for tax-exempt status during the 2010 and 2012 election campaigns.

The revelations have prompted investigations by three congressional committees and the Justice Department. The inspector general, J. Russell George, is also continuing his review.

George, who testified at the same hearing as Werfel, hinted Monday that more revelations could be coming. George told lawmakers he is also looking into bonuses received by IRS employees, and expects to release a report in the fall. He did not elaborate, however.

The agency's previous acting commissioner was forced to resign, another official retired and a third was placed on paid administrative leave.

A new inspector general's report, to be released Tuesday, says the IRS spent $50 million to hold at least 220 conferences for employees between 2010 and 2012.

The conference spending included $4 million for an August 2010 gathering in Anaheim, Calif., for which the agency did not negotiate lower room rates, even though that is standard government practice, according to a statement by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Instead, some of the 2,600 attendees received benefits, including baseball tickets and stays in presidential suites that normally cost $1,500 to $3,500 per night. In addition, 15 outside speakers were paid a total of $135,000 in fees, with one paid $17,000 to talk about "leadership through art," the committee said.

"I am absolutely appalled at the apparent waste of taxpayer dollars on frivolous conferences," said Rep. Harold Rogers, R-Ky., chairman of the full Appropriations Committee. "It seems we have a new misstep every day at the IRS."

Werfel has called the conference "an unfortunate vestige from a prior era."

White House spokesman Jay Carney said the president had not seen the forthcoming report dealing with IRS spending, but he also said Obama believes the IRS conduct was not appropriate.

"He is concerned by, and has been, excessive spending by the IRS and other agencies when it comes to conferences and travel, and has taken action accordingly," Carney said. "It's very important ... that the American people have faith that the IRS, in particular, is applying our tax laws in a fair and responsible way."

Obama appointed Werfel as acting head of the IRS and ordered him to conduct a 30-day review of the agency's operations.

"Wherever we find management failures or breakdowns in internal controls, we will move to correct these problems quickly and in a robust manner," Werfel said. "As we move forward with our work, we will be transparent about what we learn, our specific plans for improvement, the actions we take and the results achieved."

On Monday, Werfel named three top assistants to help him review IRS operations and make improvements.

Heather Maloy will become deputy commissioner for services and enforcement, W. Todd Grams will be chief of staff, and David Fisher will serve as a senior adviser to Werfel and chief risk officer. Maloy has been commissioner of the agency's large business and international division for three years. Grams is a senior official in the Veterans Affairs Department, and Fisher was a top official in the Government Accountability Office.

___

Associated Press writers Alan Fram and Josh Lederman contributed to this report.

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Follow Stephen Ohlemacher on Twitter: http://twitter.com/stephenatap

The list is compiled using data from independent and chain bookstores, book wholesalers and independent distributors nationwide.

Hardcover Fiction Last Week

1. "The Hit" by David Baldacci (Grand Central, $27.99) -

2. "Whiskey Beach" by Nora Roberts (Putnam, $27.95) 1

3. "Fly Away" by Kristin Hannah (St. Martin's, $27.99) -

4. "Daddy's Gone a Hunting" by Mary Higgins (Simon & Schuster, $26.99) 2

5. "Paris: The Novel" by Edward Rutherfurd (Doubleday, $32.50) -

6. "Wedding Night" by Sophie Kinsella (Dial, $26.00) -

7. "Vader's Little Princess" by Jeffrey Brown(Chronicle, $14.95) -

8. "The Mystery Woman" by Amanda Quick (Putnam, $26.95) -

9. "Don't Go" by Lisa Scottoline (St Martin's, $27.99) 5

10. "Gone Girl" by Gillian Flynn (Crown, $25.00) 8

Hardcover Nonfiction

1. "Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls" by David Sedaris (Little Brown, $27.00) -

2. "The One Thing" by Gary Keller (Bard Press, $24.95) 3

3. "Start" by Jon Acuff (Thomas Nelson, $22.99) -

4. "Lean In" bySheryl Sandberg (Knopf, $24.95) 1

5. "Jumpstart to Skinny" by Bob Harper (Ballantine, $25.00) -

6. "Cooked" by Michael Pollan (Penguin, $27.95) -

7. "The Duck Commander Family" by Willie & Korie Robertson (Howard Books, $23.99) 6

8. "Becoming a Supple Leopard" by Kelly Starrett (Victory Belt Publishing, $59.95) -

9. "It's All Good" by Gwyneth Paltrow (Grand Central, $32.00) 5

10. "Life Code" by Dr. Phil McGraw (Bird Street Books, $26.00) 8

Week ended April 28, 2013, powered by Nielsen BookScan (c) 2012 The Nielsen Company.

(Editing by Chris Michaud and Vicki Allen)

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who is in town for United Nations meetings on global development goals, was being honored by Rabbi Arthur Schneier's Appeal of Conscience Foundation on Thursday night.

Schneier is a Holocaust survivor and was a champion of rights of Jews under the Soviet Union. His foundation has handed out its "world statesman" award for decades, generally without controversy, to figures such as British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

But Human Rights Watch has cited a steady increase in attacks in Indonesia over the past few years due to the government's failure to confront harassment against Christians, Shia Muslims and the Ahmadiyah, an Islamic sect.

"'Appeal of Conscience' purports to be an organization that promotes religious tolerance. And the simple fact is that Yudhoyono is not promoting religious tolerance in Indonesia. Quite the opposite," Human Rights Watch's Asia advocacy director, John Sifton, told The Associated Press.

Usman Hamid, an activist with the Indonesian human rights group Kontras, also questioned the credibility of the foundation in giving the award to his country's president.

Indonesia's U.N. Mission had no comment.

Indonesia is a secular country, and majority of its 210 million Muslims are Sunni, with most practicing a moderate form of the faith.

But Religious Affairs Minister Suryadharma Ali called for the Ahmadiyah to be banned in 2011 and last year proposed that Shia Muslims convert to Sunni Islam.

And senior U.S. State Department official, Dan Baer, last week expressed concern over a "disturbing trend" in forcible closures of churches including 50 in 2012 and of Ahmadiyah mosques.

The secretary-general of Indonesia's Religious Affairs Ministry, Bahrul Hayat, said a government survey completed at the end of last year indicated that religious harmony is very strong.

"We noted that a few violations happened, but please don't generalize that intolerance has increased in Indonesia," he said. He added that in some cases, religion is blamed when instead some disputes are motivated by political, economic or other issues.

An online petition rejecting Thursday's award, launched by Imam Shofwan of Indonesia's largest Muslim group, Nahdlatul Ulama, had been signed by more than 8,000 petitioners as of early Wednesday.

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Associated Press writers Margie Mason and Niniek Karmini in Jakarta contributed to this report.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - New York City mayoral hopeful Christine Quinn spoke out on Tuesday about her decade-long struggle with bulimia and alcohol abuse after her mother's death from breast cancer.

"It was such a challenging time, and it was a time where everything was just bad," Quinn, the speaker of the New York City Council, told an audience at Barnard College. "I thought I was the only 16-year-old girl in the world who had no ability to deal with her mother dying."

Quinn, who in polls is leading a crowded field of Democratic candidates running to succeed Michael Bloomberg, would be the city's first lesbian and female mayor.

Her personal history is well known, but her comments marked the first time Quinn, who was elected council speaker in 2006, has so directly addressed her emotional unraveling after her mother's death in 1982.

In a New York Times article on Tuesday, Quinn said that eating and purging and drinking excessively had become habits by the time she entered college.

Quinn, whose memoir will be published next month, entered rehab for 28 days in 1992. A decade later, Quinn began dating Kim Catullo, a lawyer, whom she married last May.

Quinn declined to say if she was part of Alcoholics Anonymous.

"Asking for help, going to the rehab, dealing with bulimia, cutting back on drinking, getting drinking out of my life altogether - all of that helped me put the pieces back together," Quinn, 46, told the Times.

'REALITY ELECTIONS'

Quinn's dominance in the race for mayor has been challenged in recent weeks, as former Congressman Anthony Weiner openly mulls entering the race.

Weiner, an outspoken liberal who resigned from office two years ago after admitting he had sent lewd pictures of himself to women he met online, was the subject of a lengthy article in the New York Times Magazine in April.

Several media reports have suggested Weiner has already begun hiring aides for a mayoral candidacy, which he could announce within days.

Douglas Muzzio, a professor of political science at Baruch College and a long-time observer of city politics, said the volume of personal information the public has received about the mayoral candidates is "unprecedented."

"It's like reality elections," Muzzio said.

Other candidates, especially Public Advocate Bill de Blasio, have criticized on Quinn for her role in temporarily dismantling the city's term limits law, allowing Bloomberg, Quinn and other city officials to stay in office an extra four years.

Over the weekend, de Blasio held a fundraiser with gay and lesbian New Yorkers in an effort to undercut Quinn's support and exploit disenchantment with Quinn among liberals.

Asked at the Barnard event if Quinn was talking about her past travails in an effort to "soften" her image ahead of what is expected to be a bruising lead-up to the September 10 Democratic primary, Quinn said the timing had nothing to do with the race.

"To some degree I wish I had been ready sooner. But you're ready when you're ready. And no matter who you are these are not easy things to talk about publicly. They're not easy things to talk about at all," Quinn said.

For her part, Quinn said she has learned to cut herself some slack.

"The drive to be perfect as people, but particularly the drive to be perfect as women, is what keeps us from being great. Because we're not perfect," Quinn said. "It's that imperfection, those cracks, those errors and those blemishes that are the most interesting."

(Editing by Scott Malone and Nick Zieminski)

Brig. Gen. Chris Olukolade said Nigeria's military has regained ground across the northeast since President Goodluck Jonathan announced emergency rule for three states there, allowing soldiers to arrest anyone at will and occupy any building. However, there has not been any independent confirmation of any of the military's claims, as security forces shut down the region's mobile phone network and travel to the rural regions under assault remains impossible.

As the fighting continues, insurgents and civilians continue to flee. But the brigadier general remains convinced that this deployment will work as others failed to stop a bloody insurgency that has killed more than 1,600 people since it began in 2010.

"Recently, you will (have heard) one of their leaders making a call to their colleagues or whatever you call them from different countries to come to their help. And surprisingly, he also claims they are winning," Olukolade said in an interview with The Associated Press about the militants. "If they were winning, why are they looking for help?"

The military push in northeastern Adamawa, Borno and Yobe states largely has been fought outside of the public eye since Jonathan's order declaring a state of emergency in the region May 14. While jet fighters and heavy tanks have been seen traveling through major cities, the military says much of the fighting has focused on a forest reserve and the far reaches of Nigeria's borderlands with Cameroon, Chad and Niger.

In declaring the emergency, Jonathan offered a frank appraisal of the fight facing Africa's most populous nation, acknowledging that extremists had taken over villages and small towns in the region and raised their own flags, supplanting the control of Nigeria's weak central government.

Olukolade declined to offer specifics about how many of Nigeria's some 76,000 soldiers, sailors and airmen were involved in the operation. He previously told the BBC that the military carried out airstrikes against some suspected extremist camps, something he later declined to discuss. He said Thursday that the military had suffered "minimal casualties," while declining to offer any specific figures.

"We have not recorded civilian casualties to the best of our knowledge," Olukolade said. That comes after human rights groups and locals said the military purposefully killed at least 187 civilians during a recent raid on a fishing village in the northeast. The military has denied the claim, despite a Human Rights Watch report with satellite footage showing serious damage had been done to the town.

The threat has also become more severe. Authorities have said that in recent weeks extremist fighters, including those belonging to the loose extremist network known as Boko Haram, have been using increasingly sophisticated weapons, including truck-mounted anti-aircraft guns. Olukolade showed AP journalists a photograph Thursday of a shell he said soldiers collected from a battlefield in the northeast. The shell appeared to be about the diameter of a soda can and bore no manufacturer stamps.

"They've graduated from the usual trend of insurgents to go around with small arms," he said. "This time, they go out with very sophisticated and high-caliber weapons. ... So many of them are not indigenous to this area."

Olukolade added: "The issue of outside help cannot be completely ruled out. It is evident." He did not say who was arming the extremists, though diplomats and analysts say Boko Haram has loose ties to two other al-Qaida-aligned groups in Africa. Suspected Boko Haram fighters also were seen in northern Mali after Islamic extremists took control of towns there. Meanwhile, weapons used during the Libyan civil war likely also have entered greater West Africa.

As the fighting continues, it remains difficult for journalists to reach the regions affected. Military checkpoints exist on major highways and roads, limiting access. Human rights activists also have had difficulty reaching out to those living in the region.

Olukolade said anyone was welcome to see what the military had done, though he offered a large caveat for those wanting to travel in a region beset by insurgency and guerrilla attacks.

"As much as there is freedom of movement in Nigeria, as much as we have nothing to hide, we however only take responsibility for those people who offer to be guided by our security agencies," he said.

___

Jon Gambrell can be reached at www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP.

The American Cancer Society is pushing to make New York the first state to enact a comprehensive restriction on the sale of candy- and fruit-flavored cigarillos, chewing tobacco and tobacco used in water pipes. Its proposal would restrict the sale of all fruit- and candy-flavored tobacco products to tobacco shops, banning those products from convenience stories.

Maine bans the sale of larger "premium" flavored cigars and other states including Maryland have proposed laws, according to the University of Maryland Law School. New York City and Providence, R.I., also have restricted the sale of flavored tobacco.

"If New York acts, it would be the first state in the nation, and turbocharge efforts nationally," said Blair Horner, vice president of advocacy at the American Cancer Society and Cancer Action Network of New York and New Jersey.

The little cigars, chewing tobacco and loose tobacco for use in water pipes are sold individually for as little as 99 cents or in packs and avoid stiff cigarette taxes aimed at dissuading young people from smoking.

"I couldn't believe this when I saw it," Horner said. "Lawmakers may not even know about them ... this ease of access of cheap, tasty, and deadly tobacco."

New York law prohibits the sale of tobacco products to anyone under age 18. But anti-smoking advocates say restricting sales to adults-only smoke shops would stymie illegal sales and hinder youths purchasing cigarettes through an adult who buys them at a corner store.

Not everyone agrees with the proposed crackdown on sweet smokes.

"This is an adult product, like you have flavored liquors," said Audrey Silk, founder of NYC CLASH, a national smokers' rights group based in New York City. "The flavoring is an excuse to exploit the emotional driven 'for the children' (argument). Adults should be allowed to smoke flavored tobacco. There are already laws that exist that restrict sales to minors."

Driving flavored cigars and other products out of convenience stories will simply drive sales to unregulated sources, such as the Internet, the mail, or Indian tribes, said James Calvin, president of the New York Association of Convenience Stores.

"Do you want them sold in a regulated environment or sold without any controls?" Calvin said.

There has been a rise in flavored tobacco products over the last five years, he said, and store owners have improved compliance to 94 percent in state stings to root out stores selling cigarettes to underage customers. A decade ago, the compliance rate was 80 percent, he said.

A tobacco industry spokeswoman had no immediate comment Friday. Tobacco companies have said they oppose smoking by those under age 18. The companies have mounted extensive efforts to curb youth smoking and some of the billions the companies paid in a nationwide court settlement have been directed at keeping minors from starting to smoke.

In 2009, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration banned candy-, fruit- and clove-flavored cigarettes. Federal health authorities and regulators say those products appeal especially to young people and are thought to attract new smokers. The FDA says 17-year-old smokers are three times as likely to use flavored cigarettes as smokers over the age of 25.

The agency says almost 90 percent of adult smokers picked up the habit as teenagers, and it estimates the 2009 ban helps prevent an average of more than 3,600 young people each day from starting to smoke.

The ban on manufacturing, importing, marketing and distributing flavored cigarettes didn't include menthol cigarettes or some flavored tobacco products such as cigars. The FDA is studying those products.

Although New York City has a measure to restrict the candy- and fruit-flavored tobacco, city youths can easily buy them across the city line. As other states consider restrictions, the New York state effort is bolstered by New York City's already enacted ordinance that the courts have upheld.

"They are not selling broccoli and spinach flavored products," said Russ Haven of the New York Public Interest Research Group, which supports the New York bill. "These are marketed for kids."

Scheduled to start at 7:05 p.m., the game was delayed three times before finally resuming at 12:13 a.m. 2 hours, 39 minutes after the third and lengthiest delay. Before that there was uncertainty, confusion and, of course, rain.

The teams were delayed a total of 4:49, long enough for the calendar to change before nine innings were played. It ended at 2:53 a.m., giving the teams a short turnaround before a 1:05 start on Saturday.

It was the majors' second marathon game in two days. On Thursday night, Kansas City and St. Louis were delayed an hour before the first pitch and another 4 hours, 32 minutes by rain before the Royals beat Cardinals 4-2 well after 3 in the morning.

Matt Joyce and Loney connected for two-run homers in Tampa's five-run third inning off Scott Barnes (0-1), who replaced starter Corey Kluber following the weather stoppages. Loney added a solo shot to make it 6-2 in the eighth.

Jamey Wright (1-1) came in for unbeaten Tampa starter Matt Moore and pitched three innings for the Rays, who went an AL-best 18-10 in May. Cleveland's only hit was Ryan Raburn's RBI double in the fifth off Josh Lueke.

Cesar Ramos pitched three hitless innings for his first career save.

The teams had little choice but wait out the long delays. With a forecast for heavy rain on Saturday and Sunday, the umpires figured they had to try to get in one game with the possibility the whole weekend could get washed out. The teams aren't scheduled to meet again this season.

The game was delayed 1 hours, 57 minutes at the start, 13 minutes in the second inning and then for another 2:39 before it started again in front of a crowd that began as more than 30,000 and dwindled to just a few thousand, who waited it out and were rewarded for their patience.

At about 11 p.m., Indians manager Terry Francona, Rays manager Joe Maddon, Cleveland general manager Chris Antonetti and two umpires did a walking tour of the saturated outfield grass to inspect the conditions. Not long after that, the overworked grounds crew was summoned again to get the field ready and at 12:13 a.m. Wright threw a pitch to Nick Swisher.

At one point during the third delay, Maddon, with the hood of his blue sweatshirt pulled over his head to try and stay dry, took a stroll through the soggy outfield.

After thunderstorms blasted through the area, the 7:05 p.m. start was pushed back to 9:02 p.m. and the teams took the field under threatening skies.

Kluber got two outs in the second inning when play was halted by rain at 9:18 as plate umpire Fieldin Culbreth ordered the grounds crew to put the tarp on the field. But within seconds of the infield being covered, the rain stopped and the game was re-started just 13 minutes later.

Kluber gave up a walk and got Desmond Jennings to line out for the last out in the second when the rain resumed after three minutes of play and the game was stopped again at 9:34 p.m.

Both Maddon and Francona met separately with the umpires as fans scrambled to stay dry. The Indians announced they reduced $1 dollar hot dogs to 50 cents as a way of thanking fans for enduring the rain. During the third delay, fans watched out-of-town games on the giant scoreboard and cheered when Baltimore beat the first-place Detroit Tigers on a walkoff homer, moving the Indians into a temporary tie atop the AL Central.

The Rays came out swinging after the lengthy delays as Joyce and Loney homered off Barnes in the third to give Tampa Bay a 5-0 lead.

Yunel Escobar singled with one out, and with two outs, Joyce drove Barnes' pitch 411 feet over the wall in right-center for his 10th homer. Kelly Johnson walked and scored on Evan Longoria's double, and Loney followed with his sixth homer, a shot that drew boos from the doused fans hanging around.

Held without a hit through four innings by Moore and the journeyman Wright, the Indians cut it to 5-2 in the fifth on a sacrifice fly by Yan Gomes and Raburn's two-out RBI double .

NOTES: It was Loney's first multihomer game since Sept. 7, 2007. ... Browns offensive linemen, including Pro Bowler Joe Thomas, visited the Indians clubhouse before the game and then crowded into the dugout to stay out of the rain. Thomas couldn't convince one of the rookies to do a belly slide across the tarp for money. ... Indians closer Chris Perez, on the disabled list with a sore right shoulder, will be reevaluated Sunday before the next step in his rehab is mapped out. ... Rays RHP Alex Colome, who made his major league debut Thursday in Miami, was optioned to Triple-A Durham. LHP Jeff Beliveau was recalled. ... Rays RHP Chris Archer will make his season debut Saturday, the eighth starter Tampa Bay has used this season