Friday

4 p.m.
1) CONGRESS WITH NIEMEYER

Start in the heart of the “Pilot Plan,” the original planned city, where three Niemeyer-designed buildings house the three branches of Brazilian government around Praça dos Três Poderes (Three Powers Square). They’re all classic, curvy Niemeyer: the Planalto Palace, where Brazil’s first female president works; the Federal Supreme Court; and towering over both, two sky-scraping office towers and the accompanying convex and concave domes where the National Congress sits. Stroll up the esplanade past the pale green ministry buildings to one of the most recent works by Niemeyer (who is still at it at age 103): the 2006 Honestino Guimarães National Museum (SCS, Lote 2; 55-61-3325-5220) where you can see the work of contemporary artists from around the world.

6 p.m.
2) SUNSET FROM A SHRINE

The sunset in Brasília is beautiful from just about anywhere, but the best place of all to catch it is at the Ermida Dom Bosco (QI 29, Lago Sul), a Niemeyer-designed shrine across the artificial Lake Paranoá from the Pilot Plan. The lookout attracts a daily crowd that melts away once the sun is gone. Don’t follow the masses: stick it out with the stray couples (and coconut water vendors) and catch the stunning oranges and reds and lavenders that fill the sky about 20 minutes later.

8 p.m.
3) BAR HOPPING

The most popular evening activity for all local residents is to eat, drink and talk at the hyper-social bars that serve young and old, straight and gay, beer-lovers and caipirinha aficionados alike. Perhaps the most traditional of all the watering holes is 55-year-old Beirute (CLS 109, Bloco A; 55-61-3244-1717), seamlessly mixing the older regulars with a young gay crowd; the food, as you might expect, runs Middle Eastern, including the football-shaped minced-meat and bulgur snacks known in Portuguese as kibes (from 3.50 reais, or $2 at 1.7 reais to the dollar). Two other favorites are Libanus (CLS 206, Bloco C, Loja 36; 55-61-3244-9795), younger and a bit more raucous, and Boteco (CLS 406, Bloco D, Loja 35; 55-61-3443-4344), a spirited Rio de Janeiro-style bar erected, in classic Brasília juxtaposition, across the parking lot from a supermarket. Waiters bring around trays bearing snacks to choose from; the most famous is the coxinha de camarão (7.90 reais), a shrimp version of Brazil’s staple bar snack, chicken croquettes.

Saturday

9 a.m.
4) SOUPIE, ANYONE?

“Soupie” is how the Brazilians pronounce SUP, the abbreviation for stand-up paddle surfing, a sport involving you, a surfboard and a paddle. And you’ll need to pronounce it the way they do if you want the staff member at the gate of the Clube Naval (SCES, Trecho 2, Conjunto 13) to let you through to the lakeside base of Clube do Vento (55-61-8124-8596; clubedovento.com). For a mere 25 reais, you’ll soon be paddling out into Lake Paranoá toward the stunning Juscelino Kubitschek Bridge with its three criss-crossing arches, which opened in 2002 and immediately became a city landmark.

Noon
5) NORTHEASTERN BUFFET

Just about every Brazilian city outside the northeast has a healthy number of migrants from that cuisine-rich and financially poor region, but only Brasília has a branch of the northeast-based Mangai (SCE Sul; 55-61-3224-3079; mangai.com.br), a palace of regional cuisine where diners pick and choose from a buffet of 80 or so main dishes (heavy on the pork and squash and manioc) and 40 or so desserts. Payment is by weight (46.90 reais per kilogram), a typical Brazilian restaurant scheme; about 35 reais will get you a full plate, a dessert and a fresh fruit juice. Also included: hammocks on the porch overlooking Lake Paranoá to take a postprandial rest.

2 p.m.
6) MODERNIST WORSHIP

No colonial-era churches in this town. Instead, Brasília’s houses of worship fit right in with the modernist theme. You’ve already caught a glimpse of Niemeyer’s National Cathedral near the ministries, now it’s time for a visit to what must be the bluest church in the world, the Dom Bosco Sanctuary (SEPS, Quadra 702; 55-61-3223-6542; santuariodombosco.org.br), completed in 1970. Its 50-foot-high Gothic arches are filled in with 12 tones of blue stained glass, casting the interior (and its 2.75-ton chandelier and cedar cross) in haunting submarine tones. From there, continue south to the drastically more modest Igrejinha de Fátima (EQS 307/308; igrejinhadefatima.org), the city’s first church, also a Niemeyer special.

4 p.m.
7) SUNSET SAMBA

Late-afternoon samba is a Saturday tradition in town, and while the bars that host it may not be much to look at, the cold beer, a warm crowd and a hot band render the soulless venues atmospherically irrelevant. The hottest place these days is Cadê Tereza (CLS 201, Bloco B, Loja 1; 55-61-3225-0555; cadeterezabar.com.br), named after a Jorge Ben Jor song whose title means “Where’s Tereza?” The likely answer to that question: If she didn’t get there early enough, she’s probably in line. Who knows if the new hot spot has staying power, so a safe backup is the longtime classic Calaf (SBS, Quadra 2, Bloco S; 55-61-3325-7408; calaf.com.br), which brings unexpected weekend life to the otherwise abandoned Southern Banking Sector.

9 p.m.
COPENHAGEN ON PARANOá

Dress up and head to one of Brasília’s most elegant and unusual restaurants. Aquavit (SMLN, Trecho 12, Conjunto 1, Casa 5; 55-61-3369-2301; restauranteaquavit.com). There, the chef and owner Simon Lau Cederholm will greet you as if you were attending a dinner party at his house. And in fact, you are: the Denmark native opened the restaurant in his own home (which he designed; he’s also an architect) in 2005. The set menu is a mix of Danish cuisine, French technique and Brazilian ingredients. On a recent night the five course prix-fixe (192 reais, wine extra) included both a cold soup of cucumber with smoked salmon and a locally made cheese, which the chef whips and serves with cashew nuts and cashew fruit, an abundant crop in the region.

Sunday

9 a.m.
9) PETIT DéJEUNER

The idea of a true French patisserie on the bland commercial blocks in Brasília is almost as counterintuitive as having a McDonald’s on the Champs-Élysées in Paris. But they both exist. The superior of the two is Daniel Briand Pâtissier & Chocolatier (SCLN 104, Bloco A, Loja 26, 55-61-3326-1135; cafedanielbriand.com), a breakfast- and brunch-lover’s dream. Breakfast platters start at 24.90 reais. Or order their elegant pastries, buttery croissants with housemade jams, fresh-made quiches or varied pâtés à la carte.

10:30 a.m.
10) SENHORA PRESIDENTE

Head back to the Praça dos Três Poderes for a tour of the Planalto Palace, the work space of President Dilma Rousseff. The public spaces are filled with Brazilian art and modernist furniture by the celebrated Brazilian designer Sérgio Rodrigues. But that’s not all: you can also see the room where the cabinet meets, and even peek into the president’s office.

Noon
11) THE ANTI-BRASíLIA

There’s barely a trace of poverty or even of the working class in Brasília. But that’s an illusion: the poorer residents of the Federal District live in “satellite cities,” dense clusters of high-rise apartment buildings that dot Brasília’s horizon. For a taste of life as it is really lived, head 30 minutes out of town to Ceilândia, where the central feira, or market (Avenida Hélio Prates between Via M Um and Via M Dois) hums Wednesday through Sunday. For about 7 reais, food stands offer huge plates of northeastern specialties — the real organs and bone marrow of it. Under the same roof you’ll find bakers, fruit sellers, discount clothing, tobacco salesmen and butchers. If Brasília is a modern Brazilian dream, Ceilândia is modern Brazilian reality.

IF YOU GO

Tryp Brasil 21 (SHS, Quadra 6, Conjunto A, Bloco F; 55-61-3218-4700; tryphotels.com) is one of many perfectly comfortable business-style hotels in the South Hotels Sector; weekend rates are steeply discounted and run as low as 196 reais (about $114) for a double.

A half-step down in comfort but several steps up in style and history is the Brasília Palace (SHTN, Trecho 1, Conjunto 1; 55-61-3306-9100; plazabrasilia.com.br), with doubles from 239 reais. Situated away from the bustle near the presidential residence, it looks as if it had stepped right out of the ’60s, though the rooms have been renovated.

Oral sex, that is.

More than half of 15- to 19-year-olds are doing it, according to a groundbreaking study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The researchers did not ask about the circumstances in which oral sex occurred, but the report does provide the first federal data that offer a peek into the sex lives of American teenagers.

To adults, “oral sex is extremely intimate, and to some of these young people, apparently it isn’t as much,” says Sarah Brown, director of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy.

“What we’re learning here is that adolescents are redefining what is intimate.”

Among teens, oral sex is often viewed so casually that it needn’t even occur within the confines of a relationship. Some teens say it can take place at parties, possibly with multiple partners. But they say the more likely scenario is oral sex within an existing relationship. (Related story: “Technical virginity” becomes part of teens’ equation)

Still, some experts are increasingly worrying that a generation that approaches intimate behavior so casually might have difficulty forming healthy intimate relationships later on.

“My parents’ generation sort of viewed oral sex as something almost greater than sex. Like once you’ve had sex, something more intimate is oral sex,” says Carly Donnelly, 17, a high school senior from Cockeysville, Md.

“Now that some kids are using oral sex as something that’s more casual, it’s shocking to (parents).”

David Walsh, a psychologist and author of the teen-behavior book Why Do They Act That Way?, says the brain is wired to develop intense physical and emotional attraction during the teenage years as part of the maturing process. But he’s disturbed by the casual way sex is often portrayed in the media, which he says gives teens a distorted view of true intimacy.

Sex — even oral sex — “just becomes kind of a recreational activity that is separate from a close, personal relationship,” he says.

“When the physical part of the relationship races ahead of everything else, it can almost become the focus of the relationship,” Walsh says, “and they’re not then developing all of the really important skills like trust and communication and all those things that are the key ingredients for a healthy, long-lasting relationship.”

“Intimacy has been so devalued,” says Doris Fuller of Sandpoint, Idaho, who, with her two teenage children, wrote the 2004 book Promise You Won’t Freak Out, which discusses topics such as teen oral sex.

“What will the impact be on their ultimately more lasting relationships? I don’t think we know yet.”

Casual attitude is worrying

Child psychology professor W. Andrew Collins of the University of Minnesota says a relationship “that’s only about sex is not a high-quality relationship.”

In a 28-year study, Collins and his colleagues followed 180 individuals from birth. His yet-to-be-published research, presented at a conference in April, suggests that emotionally fulfilling high school relationships do help teens learn important relationship skills.

The researchers did not specifically ask about oral sex, he says. But relationships that are focused more on sex tend to be “less sustained, often not monogamous and with lower levels of satisfaction.”

Terri Fisher, an associate professor of psychology at Ohio State University, says oral sex used to be considered “exotic.” After the sexual revolution of the 1960s, it was viewed as a more intimate sexual act than sexual intercourse, but now, in young people’s minds, it’s “a more casual act.”

Beyond shock, many parents aren’t sure what to think when they discover their children’s nonchalant approach to oral sex.

“It doesn’t cross your mind because it’s not something you have done,” Fuller says. “Most parents weren’t doing this (as teenagers) in the way these kids are.”

But if parents are looking for reasons to freak out, the health risk of oral sex apparently isn’t one of them. Teenagers and experts agree that oral sex is less risky than intercourse because there’s no threat of pregnancy and less chance of contracting a sexually transmitted disease or HIV.

“The fact that teenagers have oral sex doesn’t upset me much from a public health perspective,” says J. Dennis Fortenberry, a physician who specializes in adolescent medicine at the Indiana University School of Medicine.

“From my perspective, relatively few teenagers only have oral sex. And so for the most part, oral sex, as for adults, is typically incorporated into a pattern of sexual behaviors that may vary depending upon the type of relationship and the timing of a relationship.”

Data don’t tell whole story

A study published in the journal Pediatrics in April supports the view that adolescents believe oral sex is safer than intercourse, with less risk to their physical and emotional health.

The study of ethnically diverse high school freshmen from California found that almost 20% had tried oral sex, compared with 13.5% who said they had intercourse.

More of these teens believed oral sex was more acceptable for their age group than intercourse, even if the partners are not dating.

“The problem with surveys is they don’t tell you the intimacy sequence,” Brown says. “The vast majority who had intercourse also had oral sex. We don’t know which came first.”

The federal study, based on data collected in 2002 and released last month, found that 55% of 15- to 19-year-old boys and 54% of girls reported getting or giving oral sex, compared with 49% of boys and 53% of girls the same ages who reported having had intercourse.

Though the study provides data, researchers say, it doesn’t help them understand the role oral sex plays in the overall relationship; nor does it explain the fact that today’s teens are changing the sequence of sexual behaviors so that oral sex has skipped ahead of intercourse.

“All of us in the field are still trying to get a handle on how much of this is going on and trying to understand it from a young person’s point of view,” says Stephanie Sanders, associate director of The Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction at Indiana University, which investigates sexual behavior and sexual health.

“Clearly, we need more information about what young people think is appropriate behavior, under what circumstances and with whom,” Sanders says. “Now we know a little more about what they’re doing but not what they’re thinking.”

The $16 million study, which took six years to develop, complete and analyze, surveyed almost 13,000 teens, men and women ages 15-44 on a variety of sexual behaviors.

Researchers say that the large sample size, an increased societal openness about sexual issues and the fact that the survey was administered via headphones and computer instead of face to face all give them confidence that, for the first time, they have truthful data on these very personal behaviors.

“There is strong evidence that people are more willing to tell computers things, such as divulge taboo behaviors, than (they are to tell) a person,” Sanders says.

More analysis needed

Researchers cannot conclude that the percentage of teens having oral sex is greater than in the past. There is no comparison data for girls, and numbers for boys are about the same as they were a decade ago in the National Survey of Adolescent Males: Currently, 38.8% have given oral sex vs. 38.6% in 1995; 51.5% have received it vs. 49.4% in 1995.

Further analyses of the federal data by the private, non-profit National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy and the non-partisan research group Child Trends find almost 25% of teens who say they are virgins have had oral sex. Child Trends also reviewed socioeconomic and other data and found that those who are white and from middle- and upper-income families with higher levels of education are more likely to have oral sex.

Historically, oral sex has been more common among the more highly educated, Sanders says.

Is intimacy imperiled?

The survey also found that almost 90% of teens who have had sexual intercourse also had oral sex. Among adults 25-44, 90% of men and 88% of women have had heterosexual oral sex.

“If we are indeed headed as a culture to have a total disconnect between intimate sexual behavior and emotional connection, we’re not forming the basis for healthy adult relationships,” says James Wagoner, president of Advocates for Youth, a reproductive-health organization in Washington.

Oral sex might affect teenagers’ self-esteem most of all, says Paul Coleman, a Poughkeepsie, N.Y., psychologist and author of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Intimacy.

“Somebody is going to feel hurt or abused or manipulated,” he says. “Not all encounters will turn out favorably. … Teenagers are not mature enough to know all the ramifications of what they’re doing.

“It’s pretending to say it’s just sexual and nothing else. That’s an arbitrary slicing up of the intimacy pie. It’s not healthy.”

A survey of more than 1,000 teens conducted with the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy resulted in The Real Truth About Teens & Sex, a book by Sabrina Weill, a former editor in chief at Seventeen magazine. She says casual teen attitudes toward sex — particularly oral sex — reflect their confusion about what is normal behavior. She believes teens are facing an intimacy crisis that could haunt them in future relationships.

“When teenagers fool around before they’re ready or have a very casual attitude toward sex, they proceed toward adulthood with a lack of understanding about intimacy,” Weill says. “What it means to be intimate is not clearly spelled out for young people by their parents and people they trust.”

Although governmental and educational campaigns urge teens to delay sex, some suggest teens have replaced sexual intercourse with oral sex.

“If you say to teenagers ‘no sex before marriage,‘ they may interpret that in a variety of ways,” says Fisher.

Talk is crucial

Experts say parents need to talk to their kids about sex sooner rather than later. Oral sex needs to be part of the discussion because these teens are growing up in a far more sexually open society.

Anecdotal reports for years have focused on teens “hooking up” casually. Depending on the group, teens say it can mean kissing, making out or having sex.

“Friends with benefits” is another way of referring to non-dating relationships, with a form of sex as a “benefit.”

But not all teens treat sex so casually, say teens from suburban Baltimore who were interviewed by USA TODAY as part of an informal focus group.

Alex Trazkovich, 17, a high school senior from Reisterstown, Md., says parents don’t hear enough about teen relationships where there is a lot of emotional involvement.

“They hear about teens going to the parties and having lots and lots of sex,” he says. “It happens, but it’s not something that happens all the time. It’s more of an extreme behavior.”

Three had come all the way from the San Francisco Bay area, one from Miami. Two lived less than 60 miles away, in Newark and Elizabeth, N.J. and two even closer, in Brooklyn.

All eight were arrested on prostitution charges here, snared in a new sting operation by the Nassau County police that focuses on Craigslist.org, the ubiquitous Web site best known for its employment and for-sale advertisements but which law enforcement officials say is increasingly also used to trade sex for money.

Nassau County has made more than 70 arrests since it began focusing on Craigslist last year, one of numerous crackdowns by vice squads from Hawaii to New Hampshire that have lately been monitoring the Web site closely, sometimes placing decoy ads to catch would-be customers.

“Craigslist has become the high-tech 42nd Street, where much of the solicitation takes place now,” said Richard McGuire, Nassau’s assistant chief of detectives. “Technology has worked its way into every profession, including the oldest.”

Augmenting traditional surveillance of street walkers, massage parlors, brothels and escort services, investigators are now hunching over computer screens to scroll through provocative cyber-ads in search of solicitors.

In July raids, the sheriff of Cook County, Ill., rounded up 43 women working on the streets — and 60 who advertised on Craigslist. In Seattle, a covert police ad on Craigslist in November resulted in the arrests of 71 men, including a bank officer, a construction worker and a surgeon.

And in Jacksonville, Fla., a single ad the police posted for three days in August netted 33 men, among them a teacher and a firefighter. “We got hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hits” in phone calls and e-mail messages, said John P. Hartley, the assistant chief sheriff there.

Sex and the Internet have been intertwined almost since the first Web site, but the authorities say that prostitution is flourishing online as never before. And while prostitutes also advertise on other sites, the police here and across the country say Craigslist is by far the favorite. On one recent day, for example, some 9,000 listings were added to the site’s “Erotic Services” category in the New York region alone: Most offered massage and escorts, often hinting at more.

Law enforcement officials have accused Craigslist of enabling prostitution. But the company’s president, Jim Buckmaster, said its 24-member staff cannot patrol the multitude of constantly changing listings — some 20 million per month — and counts on viewers to flag objectionable ads, which are promptly removed.

“We do not want illegal activity on the site,” he said. Asked whether the company supported the police’s placing decoy ads on Craigslist, Mr. Buckmaster said: “We don’t comment on the specifics” of law enforcement.

Craig Newmark, the site’s founder and chairman, deferred all questions to Mr. Buckmaster.

The police have also occasionally turned to Craigslist to trace stolen goods offered for sale or make drug arrests. In June, in Nassau, spotting code words like “snow” or “skiing” to refer to cocaine, they set up a sting with an undercover officer to arrest a man who advertised cocaine for sex.

Experts say that under the federal Communications Decency Act of 1996, the ads are legal and Web site owners are exempt from responsibility for content posted by users. Craigslist, for example, last fall won dismissal of a suit that alleged housing discrimination in ads posted on its Web site. “You hold the speaker liable, not the soapbox,” explained Kurt B. Opsahl, senior staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital civil liberties group based in San Francisco.

While Mr. Buckmaster said Craigslist was no different from old-media publications that have long carried sex-oriented ads, law enforcement officials say its scope and format are especially useful to the sex industry. With listings for some 450 cities around the world, Craigslist claims to have 25 million users and 8 billion page views a month. Posting advertisements, except those in the employment and some housing categories, is free, as is responding to them by e-mail.

“The Internet has allowed people to make contact in a way not possible before,” said Ronald Weitzer, a sociology professor at George Washington University and a researcher on prostitution. “Ten years ago this was not happening at all.”

As Nassau’s district attorney, Kathleen Rice, said of Craigslist: “It’s as easy as it gets.”

A court ordered the arrest of Stanislaw Lyzwinski, a lawmaker from the Self-Defense Party, after prosecutors linked him to a sex-for-work scandal, his lawyer Wieslaw Zurawski said on TVN24 television. If convicted, he could face up to 10 years in prison.

Prosecutors have brought seven charges against Lyzwinski including rape. He is also accused of taking sexual advantage of a party employee and three other women and pushing the party employee to have an abortion, which is illegal in heavily Roman Catholic Poland.

The allegations against Lyzwinski and other top politicians from his party surfaced in December 2006, when the party employee claimed in a newspaper interview that she had sex in 2001 with party leader Andrzej Lepper in exchange for a political job.

The woman has said that to keep her post, she was required to sleep with Lyzwinski. She also claimed he fathered her youngest daughter.

A paternity test in December showed Lyzwinski was not child’s father. But prosecutors pushed ahead with their sex-for-work investigation and asked parliament earlier this year to lift Lyzwinski’s immunity — which it did on Thursday. No charges have been brought against Lepper.

Both Lyzwinski and Lepper have denied the allegations and suggested the woman was pushed into making the claims by others, whom they have not identified.

Lepper was a deputy prime minister and the agriculture minister in Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski’s conservative government until he was fired last month on unrelated corruption allegations — a move that led to the collapse of Kaczynski’s three-party coalition.

Recouverts de pierres précieuses, les bonnets comptent près de 150 carats en topazes, saphirs et diamants. C’est la top-modèle brésilienne Adriana Lima qui a été choisie pour le porter et ainsi lancer la collection des fêtes de Noël. Confectionné à la main par le bijoutier italien Damiani, ce petit bout de lingerie fine est estimé à près d’1,5 million d’euros… Victoria’s Secret crée régulièrement des soutien-gorges « bijoux » aux valeurs exhorbitantes. Chaque année, des top-modèles comme Gisèle Bundchen, Tyra Banks ou encore Heidi Klum, sont choisies pour porter ces pièces. Au printemps dernier, Adriana Lima faisait la promotion d’une collection en portant un soutien-gorge valant plus de 3,5 millions d’euros.

On pourra néanmoins se consoler avec d’autres modèles eux aussi parsemés de pierres, mais plus abordables comme le « soutien-gorge miraculeux ». Recouvert de pierres Swarovski, il coûte environ 180 euros…

Vidéo. Gisèle Bundchen porte un soutien-gorge valant près de 9 millions d’euros.

Le mécontentement grandit de façon visible chez les pharmaciens, déjà en grève des gardes depuis deux mois et demi. Las de ne pas voir avancer leurs revendications concernant leurs difficultés financières croissantes auprès du gouvernement, deux syndicats rompent avec la retenue habituelle de la profession et organisent des actions de sensibilisation.

L’Union nationale des pharmacies de France, troisième syndicat de la profession, appelle ainsi ce mardi à une «journée morte». Pour cette action symbolique, les croix vertes seront éteintes et le personnel est invité à porter des blouses noires, afin d’attirer l’attention des patients sur la «mort programmée des officines de proximité», explique Frédéric Laurent, vice-président de l’organisation. Les patients pourront néanmoins continuer à acheter leurs médicaments. Le 11 octobre, ce sera le 2e syndicat de la profession, l’Union des syndicats de pharmaciens d’officine, qui organisera à Paris une action coup de poing. «En dix ans d’existence, c’est la première fois que notre profession lance une manifestation», souligne Gilles Bonnefond, président délégué de l’USPO, déplorant que les négociations avec le gouvernement «traînent».

Les syndicats ont déjà été reçus par le ministère de la Santé le 15 septembre mais sont ressortis insatisfaits de cette rencontre. «Ils sont conscients que le réseau connaît de réelles difficultés, et aucune avancée n’a été faite sur les revendications principales», explique Frédéric Laurent, qui déplore par ailleurs que la prochaine réunion soit fixée au 25 octobre. «Le projet de loi de finance de la Sécurité sociale pour 2011 sera alors déjà à l’étude. Autant ne pas se déplacer».

Une à deux fermetures par semaine

Les difficultés financières des pharmaciens suscitent une inquiétude croissante au sein de la profession. Les syndicats estiment qu’une à deux officines ferment chaque semaine. L’an dernier, «111 pharmacies ont été placées en procédure de sauvegarde, en redressement judiciaire ou en liquidation, sur un réseau de 22.500 officines. C’est peu par rapport à d’autres types de commerces, mais c’est du jamais-vu dans notre profession.», confiait Philippe Gaertner, président de la FSPF (majoritaire), au Figaro en août.

Pour remédier à cette situation, les syndicats veulent modifier le système de marges dégressives, qui est resté inchangé ces dix dernières années : plus la boîte de médicaments est chère, plus la part accordée au pharmacien est faible. Or, les volumes vendus et les prix, eux, ont baissé. Toutefois, les organisations syndicales ne s’entendent pas sur la façon de réformer le système.

La FSPF et l’UNPF souhaitent réduire la dégressivité, tandis que l’USPO préférerait augmenter la marge des médicaments les moins chers et mettre un terme aux grands conditionnements, qui consiste à délivrer aux malades chroniques une boîte avec assez de médicaments pour trois mois au lieu de les faire revenir tous les mois. Cette deuxième solution aurait l’avantage d’éviter un certain gaspillage – les boîtes n’étant jamais complètement consommées et de vérifier le bon suivi du traitement par le patient, mais aurait l’inconvénient de faire payer à ce dernier plus souvent les 50 centimes de franchise par boîte.

Les syndicats aimeraient également parvenir à un accord sur la rémunération envisagée d’autres tâches que la vente de médicaments – suivi de certaines maladies chroniques, conseils pour des cas «simples» ne nécessitant pas de consultation médicale – comme la loi HPST, votée en 2009, en offre la possibilité.

The Lord of the Rings director, who is the films’ executive producer, said it faced being shut down or moved from its location in his native New Zealand.

In an open letter, Jackson said shifting the entire project to eastern Europe “could so easily happen”.

Unions have urged actors not to work on the films due to the dispute.

‘Movie drought’

A number of organisations based in the UK, Canada, Australia and the US have said the The Hobbit’s producers have refused to negotiate a deal with them.

The International Federation of Actors said it was time for performers on The Hobbit to seek union contracts, adding that actors in New Zealand have “struggled on non-union contracts for some time”.

Jackson said the wrangle was a “grab for power” and “an attempt by the “Australian bully-boy” to exert influence over New Zealand’s film industry.

“It feels as if we have a large Aussie cousin kicking sand in our eyes… or to put it another way, opportunists exploiting our film for their own political gain.”

“Seriously, if the Hobbit goes east (Eastern Europe in fact) – look forward to a long, dry big-budget movie drought in this country,” added the film-maker.

Jackson said that he is not anti-union and “has always attempted to treat my actors and crew with fairness and respect”.

He pointed out that Hobbit actors with no union representation are part of a profit-sharing pool.

The director made all three of the Lord of the Rings films and his screen adaptation of The Lovely Bones using New Zealand locations.

Jackson is expected to become the films’ director after the departure of Guillermo del Toro due to concerns over delays – although a formal announcement has yet to be made.

But the two-movie project has not been given the financial go-ahead by Hollywood studios New Line and MGM.

Work was expected to start earlier this year but is now scheduled for a 2011 start.

Michael Douglas, 65 ans, a récemment révélé sa maladie, diagnostiquée à son retour de vacances il y a trois semaines.
Il a précisé à la télévision américaine que son cancer en était au stade IV, que sa tête et son cou étaient atteints et que les médecins évaluaient ses chances de guérison à 80%.

«Il a fait tous les examens possibles et personne n’a rien trouvé. Il savait qu’il y avait quelque chose, il le savait. Je suis furieuse qu’ils n’aient rien détecté plus tôt», a expliqué l’actrice au magazine People.

Dans le même magazine, Michael Douglas affirme pour sa part ne vouloir «blâmer personne». Selon lui, son cancer est considéré comme «soignable». «C’est un combat, et je battrai la maladie», dit-il.

Pilier d’Hollywood

Pilier d’Hollywood, comme le fut en son temps son père Kirk Douglas, aujourd’hui âgé de 93 ans, Michael Douglas a joué dans près de 40 films, dans tous les genres.

On a pu le voir notamment dans «A la poursuite du diamant vert» (1984), «Chorus Line» (1986), «Liaison fatale» (1988), «Wall Street» (1988), «La guerre des Rose» (1990), «Basic Instinct» (1992) ou «Traffic» (2001).

En septembre prochain, il sera à l’affiche de la suite de «Wall Street», «L’Argent ne dort jamais», également signé Oliver Stone.

Il s’est marié en novembre 2000 avec Catherine Zeta-Jones, avec qui il a eu deux enfants.