(AP) — Three years ago, the nation’s top public health agency picked its key battles. Now, its first report card on reaching those goals gives it a grade of pretty good but needs improvement.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s seven “winnable battles” set specific goals for 2015 for things like reducing adult smoking and childhood obesity.

The CDC issued a progress report on Thursday and officials say they are mostly pleased.

The good news includes continued declines in car accident deaths, teen births and infections that spread in hospitals. But more work needs to be done on smoking, obesity and food poisoning.

(AP) — New figures from the Washington State Patrol show that more drivers have tested positive for marijuana since the state legalized the drug last year.

In the first six months of 2013, the patrol’s crime lab says, 745 people tested positive for marijuana. Typically there are about 1,000 positive pot tests on drivers in a full year.

Patrol spokesman Bob Calkins says it doesn’t necessarily mean there’s been a rash of people driving high. He says troopers are looking harder for drivers operating under the influence of pot, and they might be ordering more marijuana blood tests.

Of the 745 people who tested positive for marijuana in the first half of this year, the state patrol says a majority tested above the legal limit of 5 nanograms of active THC per milliliter of blood. The exact number was 420.

(AP) — Police in New York, Washington and Jersey City are investigating whether recent random attacks on pedestrians are part of a violent game called “knockout,” where the object is to target unsuspecting pedestrians with the aim knocking them unconscious with one punch.

Authorities say the concept has been around for years and it’s played mostly by impulsive teenage boys looking to impress their friends. At least two deaths have been linked to the game this year and police have seen a recent spike in similar attacks.

New York City police have deployed additional officers where at least seven possible knockout-related attacks occurred in the past few weeks, including an assault on a 78-year-old woman. Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said some are smacked, some are more seriously assaulted, and some harassed.

(AP) — A U.S. safety agency is tightening the guidelines that control how automakers use government crash tests in advertising.

The change by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration likely is aimed at Tesla Motors. Tesla has promoted its electric Model S as the safest car in America, saying it earned a 5.4-star rating from the government.

The new guidelines say that the agency doesn’t give ratings higher than five stars. The agency says automakers who claim ratings higher than five stars are misleading the public.

Companies that don’t follow the guidelines could see “buyer alert” warnings from the government. They could also be kicked out of the ratings program or be referred to other agencies for further, unspecified action.

(AP) — A Ferris, Texas, woman has pleaded not guilty to allegations that she had her 9-year-old granddaughter plant drugs in her son-in-law’s car in Arizona so the grandmother could gain full-time custody of the child.

A Maricopa County Superior Court spokeswoman says 58-year-old SanJuanita Carabajal’s next proceeding on a charge of involving a child in a drug offense is scheduled for Jan. 2.

Gilbert police say Carabajal gave the child several packets containing 4 grams of cocaine and told her where to put them in her father’s vehicle.

Carabajal also allegedly told her granddaughter to tell people about the drugs at her elementary school and show one of the baggies to a teacher.

Messages left Wednesday afternoon for Carabajal’s attorney, Melinda Kovacs, weren’t immediately returned.

(AP) — New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has signed a bill banning the sale of tobacco products to anyone under age 21.

The legislation makes New York the first large city or state in the country to prohibit sales to young adults.

During a bill-signing ceremony Tuesday, Bloomberg said the law will help prevent young people from experimenting with tobacco at the age when they are most likely to become addicted.

City health officials say 80 percent of smokers start before age 21.

Tobacco companies and some retailers had opposed the age increase. They say it will simply drive teenagers to the city’s thriving black market.

(AP) — The power of the tornadoes that tore across Illinois on Sunday is becoming clear.

The National Weather Service says at least 11 twisters touched down in Illinois that day. The one that devastated the central Illinois community of Washington peaked at 190 mph and stayed on the ground for 46 miles.

The weather service says two of the tornadoes were rated EF-4, the second highest rating and the strongest to form in November in the state.

Six people across the state died because of the tornadoes Sunday, Illinois’ highest death toll from a tornado on a single November day.

(AP) — NASA’s newest robotic explorer, Maven, is on its way to Mars.

The Maven spacecraft blasted off aboard an unmanned rocket from Cape Canaveral on Monday. It will take Maven 10 months to reach Mars following a journey of more than 440 million miles.

This is NASA’s 21st mission to Mars since the 1960s. But it’s the first one devoted to studying the Martian upper atmosphere.

Scientists want to know why Mars went from being warm and wet during its first billion years, to the cold and dry place it is today. The early Martian atmosphere was thick enough to hold water and possibly support microbial life. But much of that atmosphere may have been lost to space, eroded by the sun. Maven may solve this case of mysterious climate change.

(AP) — Authorities in North Carolina say it appears the 11-year-old boy found handcuffed to a porch with a dead chicken around his neck was routinely handcuffed in the home.

Union County Sheriff’s Capt. Cody Luke also told The Charlotte Observer on Sunday that human waste was found on the home’s floor.

Wanda Sue Larson and Dorian Lee Harper were arrested Friday after a deputy found the boy. Larson is a supervisor with Union County Department of Social Services. The couple adopted four children and was fostering a fifth child.

The couple is charged with intentional child abuse inflicting injury, false imprisonment and cruelty to animals. They are scheduled to be in court Monday. It wasn’t clear whether they have lawyers yet.

The children have been removed from the home.