WASHINGTON (AP) ? Patients with hard-to-treat kidney cancer that has spread to other parts of the body gained a new drug option Friday, after U.S. government regulators approved a twice-a-day pill from Pfizer for the disease.
The Food and Drug Administration approved the company's drug Inlyta as a secondary option for patients with renal cell carcinoma that hasn't responded to previous drug treatments. Renal cell carcinoma is the most common form of kidney cancer, with an estimated 61,000 people in the U.S. newly diagnosed last year, according to the National Cancer Institute. Only about 11 percent of patients with advanced kidney cancer survive five years or more after diagnosis.
Like other recent cancer drugs, Inlyta works by blocking proteins that promote tumor growth and cancer progression.
The market for kidney cancer drugs has grown increasingly crowded in recent years, with six other new drugs approved in the last six years, including Roche's Avastin and GlaxoSmithKline's Votrient. Pfizer's drug is only the second to be designated as a backup, or second-line, treatment after other kidney cancer drugs have been prescribed. Pfizer is also conducting studies of the drug as a first-line option against kidney cancer.
"This is the seventh drug that has been approved for the treatment of metastatic or advanced kidney cell cancer since 2005," said Dr. Richard Pazdur, FDA's cancer drug director, in a statement. "Collectively, this unprecedented level of drug development within this time period has significantly altered the treatment paradigm."
The FDA approved the drug based on a single study in which patients on Inlyta, known chemically as axitinib, experienced two more months without their cancer worsening than patients taking Nexavar, a drug from Bayer and Onyx Pharmaceuticals.
The most common side effects with Inlyta included diarrhea, high blood pressure, fatigue, nausea, weight loss and decreased appetite, among others.
"Even with the advent of targeted therapies, the need remains for additional options for patients with advanced renal cell carcinoma whose disease has progressed following first-line medications," Pfizer Senior Vice President Dr. Mace Rothenberg said in a statement.
Shares of New York-based Pfizer Inc. fell 12 cents to $21.51 in afternoon trading.
Commentary in Nature: Can economy bear what oil prices have in store?Public release date: 26-Jan-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Sandra Hines shines@uw.edu 206-543-2580 University of Washington
Stop wrangling over global warming and instead reduce fossil-fuel use for the sake of the global economy.
That's the message from two scientists, one from the University of Washington and one from the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, who say in the current issue of the journal Nature (Jan. 26) that the economic pain of a flattening oil supply will trump the environment as a reason to curb the use of fossil fuels.
"Given our fossil-fuel dependent economies, this is more urgent and has a shorter time frame than global climate change," says James W. Murray, UW professor of oceanography, who wrote the Nature commentary with David King, director of Oxford's Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment.
The "tipping point" for oil supply appears to have occurred around 2005, says Murray, who compared world crude oil production with world prices going back to 1998. Before 2005, supply of regular crude oil was elastic and increased in response to price increases. Since then, production appears to have hit a wall at 75 million barrels per day in spite of price increases of 15 percent each year.
"As a result, prices swing wildly in response to small changes in demand," the co-authors wrote. "Others have remarked on this step change in the economies of oil around the year 2005, but the point needs to be lodged more firmly in the minds of policy makers."
For those who argue that oil reserves have been increasing, that more crude oil will be available in the future, the co-authors wrote: "The true volume of global proved reserves is clouded by secrecy; forecasts by state oil companies are not audited and appear to be exaggerated. More importantly, reserves often take 6 - 10 years to drill and develop before they become part of the supply, by which time older fields have become depleted." Production at oil fields around the world is declining between 4.5 percent and 6.7 percent per year, they wrote.
"For the economy, it's production that matters, not how much oil might be in the ground," Murray says. In the U.S., for example, production as a percentage of total reserves went from 9 percent to 6 percent in the last 30 years.
"We've already gotten the easy oil, the oil that can be produced cheaply," he says. "It used to be we'd drill a well and the oil would flow out, now we have to go through all these complicated and expensive procedures to produce the oil."
The same is true of alternative sources such as tar sands or "fracking" for shale gas, Murray says, where supplies may be exaggerated and production is expensive. Take the promise of shale gas and oil: A New York Times investigative piece last June reported that "the gas may not be as easy and cheap to extract from shale formations deep underground as the companies are saying, according to hundreds of industry e-mails and internal documents and an analysis of data from thousands of wells."
Production at shale gas wells can drop 60 to 90 percent in the first year of operation, according to a world expert on shale gas who was one of the sources for the commentary piece. Murray and King built their commentary using data and information from more than 15 international and U.S. government reports, peer-reviewed journal articles, reports from groups such as the National Research Council and Brookings Institution and association findings.
Stagnant oil supplies and volatile prices take a toll on the world economy. Of the 11 recessions in the U.S. since World War II, ten were preceded by a spike in oil prices, the commentary noted.
"Historically, there has been a tight link between oil production and global economic growth," the co-authors wrote. "If oil production can't grow, the implication is that the economy can't grow either."
Calculations from the International Monetary Fund, for example, say that to achieve a 4 percent growth in the global economy in the next five years, oil production must increase about 3 percent a year.
"Yet to achieve that will require either an heroic increase in oil production, ... increased efficiency of oil use, more energy-efficient growth or rapid substitution of other fuel sources," according to the commentary. "Economists and politicians continually debate policies that will lead to a return to economic growth. But because they have failed to recognize that the high price of energy is a central problem, they haven't identified the necessary solutions: weaning society off fossil fuel."
The commentary concludes: "This will be a decades-long transformation and we need to start immediately. Emphasizing the short-term economic imperative from oil prices must be enough to push governments into action now."
###
For more information:
Murray, 206-543-4730, jmurray@uw.edu
King
http://www.smithschool.ox.ac.uk/who-we-are/professor-sir-david-king/
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Commentary in Nature: Can economy bear what oil prices have in store?Public release date: 26-Jan-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Sandra Hines shines@uw.edu 206-543-2580 University of Washington
Stop wrangling over global warming and instead reduce fossil-fuel use for the sake of the global economy.
That's the message from two scientists, one from the University of Washington and one from the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, who say in the current issue of the journal Nature (Jan. 26) that the economic pain of a flattening oil supply will trump the environment as a reason to curb the use of fossil fuels.
"Given our fossil-fuel dependent economies, this is more urgent and has a shorter time frame than global climate change," says James W. Murray, UW professor of oceanography, who wrote the Nature commentary with David King, director of Oxford's Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment.
The "tipping point" for oil supply appears to have occurred around 2005, says Murray, who compared world crude oil production with world prices going back to 1998. Before 2005, supply of regular crude oil was elastic and increased in response to price increases. Since then, production appears to have hit a wall at 75 million barrels per day in spite of price increases of 15 percent each year.
"As a result, prices swing wildly in response to small changes in demand," the co-authors wrote. "Others have remarked on this step change in the economies of oil around the year 2005, but the point needs to be lodged more firmly in the minds of policy makers."
For those who argue that oil reserves have been increasing, that more crude oil will be available in the future, the co-authors wrote: "The true volume of global proved reserves is clouded by secrecy; forecasts by state oil companies are not audited and appear to be exaggerated. More importantly, reserves often take 6 - 10 years to drill and develop before they become part of the supply, by which time older fields have become depleted." Production at oil fields around the world is declining between 4.5 percent and 6.7 percent per year, they wrote.
"For the economy, it's production that matters, not how much oil might be in the ground," Murray says. In the U.S., for example, production as a percentage of total reserves went from 9 percent to 6 percent in the last 30 years.
"We've already gotten the easy oil, the oil that can be produced cheaply," he says. "It used to be we'd drill a well and the oil would flow out, now we have to go through all these complicated and expensive procedures to produce the oil."
The same is true of alternative sources such as tar sands or "fracking" for shale gas, Murray says, where supplies may be exaggerated and production is expensive. Take the promise of shale gas and oil: A New York Times investigative piece last June reported that "the gas may not be as easy and cheap to extract from shale formations deep underground as the companies are saying, according to hundreds of industry e-mails and internal documents and an analysis of data from thousands of wells."
Production at shale gas wells can drop 60 to 90 percent in the first year of operation, according to a world expert on shale gas who was one of the sources for the commentary piece. Murray and King built their commentary using data and information from more than 15 international and U.S. government reports, peer-reviewed journal articles, reports from groups such as the National Research Council and Brookings Institution and association findings.
Stagnant oil supplies and volatile prices take a toll on the world economy. Of the 11 recessions in the U.S. since World War II, ten were preceded by a spike in oil prices, the commentary noted.
"Historically, there has been a tight link between oil production and global economic growth," the co-authors wrote. "If oil production can't grow, the implication is that the economy can't grow either."
Calculations from the International Monetary Fund, for example, say that to achieve a 4 percent growth in the global economy in the next five years, oil production must increase about 3 percent a year.
"Yet to achieve that will require either an heroic increase in oil production, ... increased efficiency of oil use, more energy-efficient growth or rapid substitution of other fuel sources," according to the commentary. "Economists and politicians continually debate policies that will lead to a return to economic growth. But because they have failed to recognize that the high price of energy is a central problem, they haven't identified the necessary solutions: weaning society off fossil fuel."
The commentary concludes: "This will be a decades-long transformation and we need to start immediately. Emphasizing the short-term economic imperative from oil prices must be enough to push governments into action now."
###
For more information:
Murray, 206-543-4730, jmurray@uw.edu
King
http://www.smithschool.ox.ac.uk/who-we-are/professor-sir-david-king/
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
France's President Nicolas Sarkozy, left, arrives with Prime Minister Francois Fillon to address his New Year speech to the Justice representatives at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Friday, Jan. 13, 2012. The euro fell to a 17-month low against the dollar on news reports that France's credit rating might be downgraded by Standard & Poor's. If France were downgraded it could hurt efforts to resolve Europe's debt crisis. (AP Photo/Charles Platiau, Pool)
France's President Nicolas Sarkozy, left, arrives with Prime Minister Francois Fillon to address his New Year speech to the Justice representatives at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Friday, Jan. 13, 2012. The euro fell to a 17-month low against the dollar on news reports that France's credit rating might be downgraded by Standard & Poor's. If France were downgraded it could hurt efforts to resolve Europe's debt crisis. (AP Photo/Charles Platiau, Pool)
German chancellor Angela Merkel, attends a press conference in Kiel, northern Germany, Saturday Jan. 14, 2012 after a meeting with Christian Democratic (CDU) party leaders. German Chancellor Angela Merkel says Standard & Poor's downgrades of nine eurozone countries underline the fact that Europe has a "long road" in front of it to win back investors' confidence. Merkel pushed Saturday for European countries to implement "as soon as possible" a planned pact to strengthen budget discipline and said eurozone countries also must move quickly to implement their permanent rescue fund - the so-called European Stability Mechanism. (AP Photo/dapd: Philipp Guelland)
German chancellor Angela Merkel, speaks at a press conference in Kiel, northern Germany, Saturday Jan. 14, 2012 after a meeting with Christian Democratic (CDU) party leaders. German Chancellor Angela Merkel says Standard & Poor's downgrades of nine eurozone countries underline the fact that Europe has a "long road" in front of it to win back investors' confidence. Merkel pushed Saturday for European countries to implement "as soon as possible" a planned pact to strengthen budget discipline and said eurozone countries also must move quickly to implement their permanent rescue fund - the so-called European Stability Mechanism. (AP Photo/dapd: Philipp Guelland)
German chancellor Angela Merkel, speaks at a press conference in Kiel, northern Germany, Saturday Jan. 14, 2012 after a meeting with Christian Democratic (CDU) party leaders. German Chancellor Angela Merkel says Standard & Poor's downgrades of nine eurozone countries underline the fact that Europe has a "long road" in front of it to win back investors' confidence. Merkel pushed Saturday for European countries to implement "as soon as possible" a planned pact to strengthen budget discipline and said eurozone countries also must move quickly to implement their permanent rescue fund - the so-called European Stability Mechanism. (AP Photo/dapd: Philipp Guelland)
PARIS (AP) ? Amid a wave of criticism, Standard & Poor's defended its decision to downgrade nine European countries and insisted Saturday that the region's leaders aren't doing enough to solve their debt crises.
The prime minister of France, the biggest economy hit by the downgrade, vowed to press ahead with cost-cutting measures that opponents say will suffocate growth. The loss of its coveted AAA status wounded France's self-image and market credibility just as it's facing a new recession and presidential elections.
The move Friday night may make it more expensive for struggling countries to borrow money, reduce debts and sustain growth. It also came just as crucial negotiations between the Greek government and its private creditors appeared close to collapse.
Voices rose up Saturday against the power that ratings agencies wield. The criticism came from countries targeted by the downgrade such as Austria and Cyprus as well as from Germany, which was spared the blow.
The downgrade brought a downbeat end to a mildly encouraging week for Europe's most debt-laden nations. It also served as a reminder that the 17-country eurozone faces what German Chancellor Angela Merkel called a "long road" ahead to win back investors' confidence.
Cyprus President Dimitris Christofias called the downgrade "unacceptable."
"The latest downgrade is completely unfair and loaded with ulterior motives," he told reporters. "Just when the Cyprus economy is breathing easier and showing signs of emerging from the crisis, and when our financing needs for 2012 and perhaps beyond 2012, have been covered, a (credit ratings) agency comes along to downgrade."
Austria's chancellor criticized S&P's decision to strip his country of its AAA rating, and noted that his coalition government is working on an austerity package.
Werner Faymann wrote on his Facebook page that the decision showed "that Austria must become more independent from the financial markets."
In Germany, a senior lawmaker with Merkel's conservative party, Michael Meister, suggested action to reduce the significance of ratings, and Merkel signaled her support.
The foreign minister called for independent European ratings agencies instead of relying solely on the leading, U.S.-based agencies such as Standard & Poor's.
And Vice Chancellor Philipp Roesler, who is also the economy minister, was quoted as telling the weekly Der Spiegel, "It is apparent time and again that U.S. rating agencies pursue very much their own goals."
It's unclear though whether a European agency would come to different conclusions or reduce what critics see as a disproportionate influence that ratings agencies have on markets and policymakers.
S&P spokesman Martin Winn dismissed suggestions that the agency's decisions were political and could further hurt indebted countries. "The track record of our sovereign ratings as indicators of default risk worldwide is very strong," he told The Associated Press.
S&P analyst Moritz Kraemer said in a conference call Saturday that European government measures aren't sufficient to restore confidence.
"They have not achieved a solution that is sufficient in size or scope," he said. He added that austerity measures require "huge sacrifices" of the public that might prompt a backlash.
Merkel and French Prime Minister Francois Fillon said the downgrades should push European countries to quickly implement a planned pact to strengthen budget discipline.
Germany and France have piloted rescue efforts for other eurozone countries as the continent has been swept up in crisis after crisis over the past two years. The downgrade, by pushing up France's borrowing costs, could make it harder for France to help others.
Merkel sought to allay concerns that the downgrade of France would complicate the work of the bloc's temporary rescue fund, the euro440 billion ($560 billion) European Financial Stability Facility. However, she underlined the urgency of putting its permanent successor, the European Stability Mechanism, in place quickly.
Fillon said France's government wouldn't adjust this year's budget yet, because it had been devised with an assumption of higher borrowing costs. S&P had warned 15 European nations in December that they were at risk for a downgrade, and Moody's has France and other European governments on review.
The downgrade, three months before France holds presidential elections, was "an alert that should not be dramatized any more than it should be underestimated," Fillon said.
Standard & Poor's stripped France of its coveted AAA status, knocking it down one notch to AA+, the level of U.S. long-term debt after S&P downgraded it last summer. It dropped Italy even lower. Germany retained its top-notch rating, but Portugal's debt was consigned to junk.
Stocks fell Friday as downgrade rumors reached the trading floors of Europe and the United States. But the declines were nothing like the wrenching swings of last summer and fall.
The prime minister of Spain ? also downgraded ? promised to reduce the budget deficit by reining in public spending. In his first major speech to Popular Party members as premier and party leader, Mariano Rajoy described "living a difficult moment."
France's presidential elections could complicate Europe's discussions. President Nicolas Sarkozy, who has been at the heart of the debate, is highly unpopular and far from certain of winning a second term.
The man who tops polls ahead of the April and May elections, Socialist Francois Hollande, said the downgrade was a punishment for conservative Sarkozy's policies. He said Saturday that austerity measures were stifling growth and France's competitiveness.
___
Geir Moulson in Berlin, Cecile Brisson and Jeffrey Schaeffer in Paris and Menelaos Hadjicostis in Nicosia, Cyprus, contributed to this report.
WASHINGTON ? The Justice Department is publicly rebutting Republican criticism of the legality of President Barack Obama's recent recess appointments of a national consumer watchdog and other officials.
The department released a 23-page legal opinion Thursday summarizing the advice it gave the White House before the Jan. 4 appointments. GOP leaders have argued the Senate was not technically in recess when Obama acted so the regular Senate confirmation process should have been followed.
Assistant Attorney General Virginia Seitz wrote that the president has authority to make such appointments because the Senate is on a 20-day recess, even though it has held periodic pro forma sessions in which no business is conducted. Seitz argued the pro forma sessions ? some with as few as one member present ? have not been sufficient for the chamber to exercise its constitutional authority to advise and consent to normal presidential nominations.
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell has said Obama has endangered the nation's systems of checks and balances, and Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch says the appointments are a very grave decision by an autocratic White House.
Senate Republicans have been using their ability to block or stall Senate confirmation of some regular nominees as a way to curb agencies they believe have taken or are poised to take actions they disagree with.
On Jan. 4, Obama appointed Richard Cordray, a former attorney general of Ohio, to be the first director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Obama also appointed two Democrats and a Republican to the National Labor Relations Board that day. There was stiff Republican opposition to creating the new consumer agency, which was authorized in the financial regulation law, and Republicans have argued that the labor board has tilted toward unions under Obama's Democratic administration.
The Justice official who wrote the opinion, Seitz, heads the department's Office of Legal Counsel, which is empowered to provide binding legal opinions to the executive branch.
Her new memo cites a Justice Department legal opinion from President George W. Bush's Republican administration in justifying Obama's recent appointments. The Bush administration opinion from 2004 says that a recess during a session of the Senate can meet constitutional requirements for permitting the president to make recess appointments as long as the recess is of sufficient length. Seitz noted that the last five presidents have made recess appointments during recesses of 14 days or less.
In December, the Senate agreed to adjourn until Jan. 23 but to convene pro forma sessions in which no business was to be conducted every Tuesday and Friday.
The Senate pro forma sessions in which no business was conducted, do not "in our opinion" interrupt the recess "in a manner that would preclude the president" from acting, Seitz wrote in her Jan. 6 opinion.
Beginning in late 2007, the Senate has frequently conducted pro forma sessions that typically last only a few seconds and that "apparently require the presence of only one senator," Seitz wrote. Under a legal framework dating back nearly a century, recess appointments have been permitted when the Senate cannot receive communications from the president or participate as a body in confirming nominees.
In an op-ed article in the Washington Post, Edwin Meese, who served as attorney general under Republican President Ronald Reagan, and Todd Gaziano, a former Office of Legal Counsel attorney who is now a fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation, called Obama's actions "a breathtaking violation of the separation of powers."
The GOP's unsuccessful opposition to creating the consumer watchdog agency has turned into opposition to potential nominees to lead the office. Stiff Republican opposition headed Obama off from even nominating Elizabeth Warren, the interim official who helped set up the office, to be its permanent chief.
There is GOP resistance as well to filling slots on the National Labor Relations Board that Republicans feel has become pro-labor under Obama. If Republicans keep enough slots vacant on the labor board, they can prevent it from acting at all.
The pro forma sessions have been used by both Democratic and Republican senators in an effort to stave off recess appointments.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said in 2008 that the pro forma sessions were designed to prevent the president ? at that time Bush ? from exercising his constitutional power to make recess appointments.
Last year with Obama in the White House, some Republican senators urged House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, not to pass any resolution that would allow the Senate to recess or adjourn for more than three days. The Constitution provides that neither the House nor the Senate shall adjourn for more than three days without the consent of the other. No concurrent resolution of adjournment has been introduced in either chamber since May of last year.
A central authority automotive public sale is usually auctioning off government-seized automobiles, or decommissioned cars that the company no longer uses.
Government automotive public sale events are on a regular basis held ceaselessly at other locations. The fastest and the best way to be told whilst and the place a central authority car auction will happen are to test the local newspapers. Differently of finding a central authority automotive auction is to find an internet public sale provider to find it for you. There could be some charges concerned however it?s going to prevent a lot of time.
If you?re about to bid on a government car public sale, you should still be careful about sure thins. The truth that you might be purchasing a car from a government automobile public sale does not imply that the car you will purchase will probably be in nice situation or that there can be no issues of it. The federal government can public sale vehicles that are now not required but in addition can public sale cars accrued from other companies and even criminals.
You will have to arrive at the auction early, choose an automobile and than start with the checks. This can be a should to test the Car Id Numbers (in the event that they fit at the papers and at the car) and run a CARFAX report. Ask the auction administrator for another details about the auto such as the mileage information. It?s best of you can have the auto inspected through a mechanic. Having performed all of the above, you will have obtained sufficient data to decide ? weather to bid in this automotive or not.
A thing to watch out approximately ? there is a festival in the bidding at any govt automobile auction. What it method is that each new bid must be upper than the previous ones. As you can also wager, the automobiles which might be in better condition will draw in numerous attention ? not best from automotive hunters such as you but in addition from different car dealers. Which means an automotive might reach a bid so much upper than its present market value. Move with a clear funds and an excellent analysis approximately car prices in order that you do not finally end up spending too much or more than the same car marketplace value.
If you would like extra facts with regard to car auctions, visit Denis Q Arbogust?s web site in a jiffy.
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MANCHESTER, New Hampshire (Reuters) ? Mitt Romney is poised to take a big step toward the Republican U.S. presidential nomination on Tuesday by capturing New Hampshire, hoping to ride out last-minute attacks from his rivals and recover from a self-inflicted wound.
The former governor of neighboring Massachusetts carried a sizeable lead in polls into voting day, a sufficient cushion that should force rivals Ron Paul, Jon Huntsman, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum into a battle for second place.
Romney, 63, would be the first Republican who is not an incumbent president to win the first two early voting states, after his slim eight-vote victory over Rick Santorum a week ago in the Iowa caucuses.
A more resounding win on Tuesday would give him momentum going into South Carolina on January 21 and Florida on January 31. He leads in both states and victories there could all but sew up his nomination to face Democratic President Barack Obama in the November 6 election.
"You're going to make a big statement tomorrow, let's take it to the next step, give me the boost I need, I hope," said Romney in Bedford on Monday night at his final rally of the day.
It was unclear how much damage had been done by a mess of his own making in which Romney declared "I like being able to fire people," in addressing his desire for greater competition between health insurance companies.
His opponents, Republican and Democratic alike, quickly seized on the comment as evidence of an out-of-touch politician and coupled it with attacks over his record at Bain Capital, a firm that bought companies and restructured them.
In a remarkable turnaround in a party known for being friendly to business, Republicans seeking to slow Romney down sounded more like populists as they bashed Romney's work as a venture capitalist.
Gingrich, brooding over negative attacks from Romney and his backers that knocked him out of the front-runner position, has launched the toughest onslaught on Romney.
"Mitt Romney was not a capitalist during his reign at Bain. He was a predatory corporate raider," says a video produced by a pro-Gingrich group.
New Hampshire voting stations close at 7 p.m. EST (midnight GMT). About 250,000 people are expected to vote in the Republican primary while 75,000 are likely to vote to endorse Obama's re-election.
HUNTSMAN HOPING FOR 'BONANZA'
"Mitt Romney, I think he will come out on top," said voter Albert Guptill in Nashua. "By how much, I don't know, but I think he will, yeah."
But not everyone was happy about voting for him.
Eli Haykinson of Bedford said he did not want to vote for Romney but might have to because he could have the best chance to defeat Obama.
"I personally don't like his huge campaign style. You don't really get to feel him at all. I don't want to vote for him but I may have to," Haykinson said.
The Monday Suffolk University tracking poll had Romney at 33 percent, Paul 20 percent, Huntsman 13 percent, Gingrich 11 percent, Santorum 10 percent and undecided 12 percent.
Since victory looked out of reach for Romney's rivals, they were waging a fierce battle to sway undecided voters their way in the final hours and win second place.
Both libertarian Representative Paul and Huntsman, a former U.S. ambassador to China, have been on the rise in recent days.
"It could be a bonanza," Huntsman told CNN.
Former Pennsylvania Senator Santorum, who nearly won Iowa by appealing to social conservatives, has found that his message in New Hampshire is not attracting the same surge of support.
He and Texas Governor Rick Perry, along with Gingrich, are looking to South Carolina to challenge Romney as his conservative alternative.
Romney leads there for now but Gingrich backers have launched $3.4 million worth of ads in South Carolina to try to slow him down in the conservative state.
(Additional reporting by Ros Krasny, Sam Youngman, Jason McLure and Mary Milliken; editing by Mohammad Zargham)
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Public release date: 26-Jan-2012
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