Komputer for Alle 1998 #6/1998 CD 6 (Gul).iso/web/ffa/wwwenv~1.org/arrs/digest/news38~3.htm/text0006.txt

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> The Star Online


                   Monday, April 21, 1997

                   Kukup breeders: Effluents killing fish
                   By Shahar Yaacob


                   PONTIAN: More than RM100,000 worth of fish being bred in
                   cages in the sea off Kukup, 24km south of here, have
                   died in the past two weeks believed to be due to
                   effluents flowing from a nearby river.

                   A breeder Ng Swee San alleged that the effluents had
                   reached several cages close to the rivermouth. He hoped
                   the authorities concerned would react quickly to contain
                   the problem.

                   He said the breeders found the fish behaving strangely
                   about two weeks ago and their first thought was that the
                   old problem of ships desludging had reappeared.

                   But there was no sign of the oily substance and so they
                   decided to scout around for a clue.

                   "We discovered some dead fish floating in the water
                   around the mouth of Sungai Durian. As we moved further
                   inland there were more dead fish.

                   "When we returned to Kukup we probed the water edgeand
                   took several water samples which we sent to the relevant
                   authorities for analysis. We also lodged a police report
                   at Permas."

                   Some 70 breeders are operating pen-culture fish breeding
                   in Kukup water spanning several kilometres along the
                   strait between the Kukup coastline and Kukup island.

                   Most of the harvest are sold to seafood restaurants
                   while some are exported to Singapore.

                   Most of the fish fry are imported from Taiwan as they
                   are more resistant to the water condition in Kukup.

                   Among the fishes being bred are tiger kerapu and siakap
                   which can attain a weight of 10kg in four months
                   fetching a price of RM10 per kg.

                   "Up to today I have lost at least RM40,000 and will lose
                   more if the situation is not brought under control,"
                   said Ng.

                   It is believed that the Department of Environment had
                   collected water samples and is investigating the source
                   of the alleged pollution.

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 22:49:25 +0800 (SST)
>From: Vadivu Govind <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: (TH) Underwater wedding for 'promotion of coral conservation'
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"


                               April 21, 1997

                               [BANGKOK POST]

                         ENVIRONMENT / SOCIAL EVENT

             Underwater wedding in Trang province
             All for 'promotion of coral conservation'
             by Chakrit Ridmontri
             Trang


             The country's first underwater wedding was held
             yesterday, with the brides and grooms expressing
             the hope that the ceremony would promote coral
             reef conservation and responsible tourism.

             The two couples, Pornlada Krobthong and Nophadol
             Surathin, and Susisda Sampao and Veera
             Khorvichienkul, descended 30 feet down to the
             ceremony venue in front of Koh Wan. Marble
             tables were placed on the seabed for the
             ceremony.

             The couples' phuyai was the former deputy
             governor of Trang, Chane Wiphatborwornwong. He
             took the plunge to pour holy sand over the hands
             of the brides and grooms.

             Sikao district chief Nawin Sinthusa-ard signed
             the wedding registrations, specially printed on
             slate boards.

             The event was late in the morning when the sea
             was calm and visibility was good. But the water
             turned murky.

             "Doing your signature underwater is difficult as
             the pen and slate boards keep floating up and
             down," said Mr Nawin.

             Mr Chane, the former deputy governor who is the
             eldest of the divers, was exhausted after
             spending almost an hour underwater.

             Even the brides and grooms, experienced divers,
             faced no fewer difficulties as they had to kneel
             down with their hands extended.

             "Sitting on the sea floor isn't easy, but posing
             for the cameramen underwater is even more
             difficult," said Ms Pornlada.

             But the wedding went smoothly amid cheers from
             people on ferries surrounding the spot.

             The couples said they hoped the event would
             generate public awareness of the need to look
             after the underwater environment, especially
             coral reefs.

             "I hope it'll encourage people to save the coral
             reefs in Trang, which are beautiful and also
             sensitive," said Mr Nophadol.

             Surin Tothabtieng, president of Trang Chamber of
             Commerce, said he and Trang governor Yongyudh
             Wichaidith decided to sponsor the wedding
             because the pairs met and fell in love in Trang
             while they were collecting garbage in the coral
             reefs.

             He said scuba diving should be promoted as it
             was a way of conserving coral reefs, as the
             divers can do useful things such as collecting
             garbage.

             Some local conservation groups stayed away from
             the underwater wedding activity.

             Pisit Chansnoh, president of Yadfon Association,
             said anchoring in coral reefs was rampant and it
             was impossible to control it because of the
             increasing number of ferries carrying tourists
             to the diving spots.

             He added that the fertility of coral reefs
             cannot be evaluated from only the corals, but
             also the diversity of species.

             More divers will chase away fish and other
             marine lives from their habitats, he said.

Article copyright Post Publishing Public Co., Ltd 1997
Reprinted for non-commercial use only.
Website: http://www.bangkokpost.net

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 22:49:30 +0800 (SST)
>From: Vadivu Govind <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail], [e-mail]
Subject: (TH)  Beef scare prompts beef-eating festival
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"



                                 April 21, 1997

                               [BANGKOK POST]

                                   HEALTH

             Beef scare prompts festival
             Slaughterhouses to be given certification
             Aphaluck Bhatiasevi

             Concerned about falling beef sales due to fears
             of anthrax, government organisations have joined
             hands to stage a beef-eating festival this
             Friday at which various film stars will take
             part.

             The event is jointly organised by the Interior,
             Agriculture and Public Health ministries and the
             Bangkok Metropolitan Administration. It will
             take place at Siam Jusco department store in
             Nonthaburi.

             The government authorities are cooperating to
             help train beef sellers on Thursday, to inform
             them of the possible contraction of diseases
             from cattle.

             Certificates will be given to slaughterhouses
             and beef sellers approved by the Public Health
             Ministry to reassure the public that the beef
             purchased is free of anthrax, according to the
             ministry's Information and Public Relations
             Office director, Prapan Teekhavanit.

             Anthrax is a bacterial disease caused by
             "bacillus anthracis". It can be transmitted from
             cattle to humans, but is non-communicable
             between humans.

             In beef, the disease can be destroyed under 140
             degrees celsius temperature for 1-3 hours or if
             exposed under 100 degrees celsius of moist heat
             for 5-30 minutes.

             Dr Prapan said that according to a group of
             Muslim beef sellers who recently urged the
             Public Health Ministry to help provide
             clarifications to the public about anthrax, the
             daily sales of beef dropped to only 10 percent
             of what it was following the news on the
             outbreak of anthrax.

             The Livestock Department has imposed strict
             measures in importing cows and buffaloes in
             border provinces by making sure that all cattle
             imported into the country are vaccinated before
             being sold in the country.

Article copyright Post Publishing Public Co., Ltd 1997
Reprinted for non-commercial use only.
Website: http://www.bangkokpost.net

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 22:49:37 +0800 (SST)
>From: Vadivu Govind <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: (MY)  Trapped crocodile finds home in Malacca Zoo
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"


>The Star Online


                   Monday, April 21, 1997
                   Trapped crocodile finds home in Malacca Zoo


                   MALACCA: A female freshwater crocodile found trapped in
                   a fishing net in Kuala Sungai Tampok, Rengit, Johor, on
                   Saturday has been placed at the Malacca Zoo.

                   Zoo public relations officer Masri Arop said the 300kg
                   female crocodile would be paired with a male crocodile
                   caught in Puchong, Selangor, on March 25.

                   He said the 4.4m reptile, known scientifically as
                   Crocodileus Porosus and locally known as buaya tembaga,
                   was the biggest female fresh water crocodile obtained by
                   the zoo.

                   Masri said fisherman Atan Sulong, 48, found the catch
                   when he was on a regular fishing trip on Saturday.

                   The crocodile was later transferred to its new home by
                   officers and rangers of Kluang National Parks and
                   Wildlife Department and Malacca Zoo the same day.

                   He said the crocodile, believed to be between 20 and 25
                   years old, has been named Rengit.

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 22:49:42 +0800 (SST)
>From: Vadivu Govind <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: (HK) Pig dung 'trick' on right scent
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"


>South China Morning Post
Internet Edition
April 211997

Pig dung 'trick' on right scent
ALEX LO


     Treated pig dung which does not stink has become a popular fertiliser with
farmers.

 Researchers say they cannot keep up with demand for the mixture of sawdust
and dung which is composted into odourless fertiliser.

 "We are not mass-producing because we are only doing experiments, but
farmers are already demanding more than we can provide," City University
biologist Professor Nora Tam Fung-yee said.

 Farmers can save money on chemical fertilisers, said a spokesman from the
Tsui Keng Vegetable Marketing Co-operative Society in the New Territories.

 "Chemicals are expensive but this stuff is free."

 Last year, the Agriculture and Fisheries Department distributed about
50,000 kilograms to more than 50 farmers at the government farm in Ta Kwu Leng.

 The new method took advantage of the natural process of composting to
maximise nutrient value. Professor Tam said the trick was to regulate
moisture and air supply.

 Fresh pig dung contained a high level of bacteria which consumed nutrients
and damaged plants, she said. But as the mixture decomposed, it produced
excellent fertilisers containing nitrate, phosphorus and potassium.

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 10:17:54 -0500 (CDT)
>From: [e-mail] (Tamara Hamilton HSUS Laboratory Animals)
To: [e-mail]
Subject: Washington Post Editorial on Bion
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>

Monkeys in Outer Space?
By Daniel S. Greenberg

Sunday, April 20 1997; Page C07
The Washington Post
In the bitter strife between mainstream science and animal-rights
advocates, the scientists
have made a strong case for experimenting on animals to advance human
welfare. In fact,
anyone who disputes them is likely to be relegated to the nut fringe.
But you don't have to be an animal-rights zealot to wonder about NASA's
sinking 31 million
scarce government dollars into an international study of how monkeys
with electrodes in
their brains and wires on their bodies react to a two-week space
voyage.
The question was of scientific interest and practical importance in the
long-ago beginnings of
manned space flight, when human experience in the unknowns of
weightlessness was limited
to a few days. But in recent years, human space travelers have remained
in orbit for months
at time, serving as the subjects of sophisticated and productive
experiments on the bodily
and psychological effects of zero gravity.
Many unknowns remain about the ill effects of space on bone density,
muscle mass and
cardiac fitness. But the best experimental subjects for studying the
effects of space on
humans are humans in space. And these days, they're plentiful, aboard
the Russian Mir and
the American Space Shuttle.
NASA's animal experimenters, however, won't give up. And their rigidity
is compounded by
American commitments to sustain the impoverished Russian space
enterprise, which has a
long tradition of shooting monkeys into space.
Thus, when a Space Shuttle flight for a Franco-American monkey
experiment was canceled
in 1994, the project -- called Bion 11 -- was handed over to the
Russians. People for the
Ethical Treatment of Animals, French animal-rights organizations and
individual scientists
disputed the scientific value of the experiment. Last summer, the House
voted to cut off its
funds. NASA bounced back with a favorable evaluation from a panel of
scientists, and the
termination effort failed in the Senate.
On Christmas Eve, in a capsule supplied by the Russians, Bion 11,
carrying two rhesus
monkeys, was launched into orbit from a Russian cosmodrome for a
two-week flight.
As described in the authoritative weekly Space News, "While in orbit,
the monkeys were
dressed in space suits, which were secured to chairs. Their heads were
shaved and small
holes were drilled into their skulls to permit sensors to take regular
readings of body
temperature. A half-dozen electrodes were put into the monkeys'
muscles, with the wiring
connected to recording devices. On the ground in Moscow, two other
rhesus monkeys were
in the same basic position to permit comparisons of the reaction to
weightlessness."
The experiment was deemed a success. But then one of the monkeys died,
in circumstances
unrelated to its space voyage, according to NASA officials and their
colleagues in the
Russian Institute of Biomedical Problems, who offered the following
account.
Shortly after their return from space, the monkeys were anesthetized at
the institute for the
removal of bone and muscle specimens. On the following day, as one of
them was emerging
from the anesthetic, it went into cardiac arrest and died, despite
efforts at resuscitation. The
cause of death is under study by NASA and the Russian institute.
Meanwhile, preparations continue for launching Bion 12 in 1998.
The scientific justification for these antiquated experiments is nil.
But that doesn't deter the champions of animal experimentation from
emulating the extravagant rhetoric of their opposites. In the old days,
space enthu
siasts invented tales of Tang and Teflon coming out of space research,
which they most assuredly did not. They have since graduated to grander
claims, of similarly thin substance.
In a statement supporting the Bion experiment, Americans for Medical
Progress declared that the project would not only help humans in space
but would also "assist in understanding and finding treatments for
anemia, osteop
orosis, muscular atrophy and immune system dysfunction for patients on
earth."
As a recruiting tool for the animal-rights movement, Bion is a dream
that can turn into a nightmare for legitimate experimentation on
animals.
Daniel S. Greenberg is editor and publisher of Science & Government
Report, a Washington newsletter.















Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 12:57:12 -0400
>From: Shirley McGreal <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: Bear killers seek import permits
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

        The seven men listed below have filed applications to import Polar
bear trophies (no women). According to the 9 April Federal Register:

--------------------------------------------------------------------

    The public is invited to comment on the following application(s)
for permits to conduct certain activities with marine mammals. The
application(s) was/were submitted to satisfy requirements of the Marine
Mammal Protection Act of 1972, as amended (16 U.S.C. 1361 et seq.) and
the regulations governing marine mammals (50 CFR part 18).
    The following applicants have each requested a permit to import a
sport-hunted polar bear (Ursus maritimus) from the Northwest
Territories, Canada for personal use.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
          Applicant/address                   Population          PRT-
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bruno Scherrer, Los Angeles, CA......  Northern Beaufort......    826942
David Anaman, Hemlock, MI............  ......do...............    826910
Derek A. Burdeny, Omaha, NE..........  ......do...............    827122
Harry Brickley, Indianapolis, IN.....  ......do...............    827123
Bruce Levein, Mercer Is., WA.........  Southern Beaufort......    826941
William Katen, Patchogue, NY.........  ......do...............    826911
Mark David Samsill, Ft. Worth, TX....  ......do...............    827037
------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Written data or comments, requests for copies of the complete
application, or requests for a public hearing on this application
should be sent to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Office of
Management Authority, 4401 N. Fairfax Drive, Room 430, Arlington,
Virginia 22203, telephone [phone] or fax [phone] and must be
received within 30 days of the date of publication of this notice.
Anyone requesting a hearing should give specific reasons why a hearing
would be appropriate. The holding of such hearing is at the discretion
of the Director.

Dr. Shirley McGreal, Chairwoman
International Primate Protection League, POB 766 Summerville SC 29484 USA
Phone: [phone] Fax: [phone] E-mail [e-mail] and [e-mail]
Web page (revised January 1997): http://www.sims.net/organizations/ippl/

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:01:37 -0400 (EDT)
>From: [e-mail]
To: [e-mail]
Subject: (US)Address to Help Animal Flood Victims in North Dakota
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>


>From Sherrill in Tulsa..:

The bank in Grand Forks, ND is under water, so the Humane Society is
requesting cashier's checks instead of regular checks, please. Here's
the address:  Humane Society of Grand Forks, Rural Route 2, Grand Forks,
ND   58203  Please put on the cashier's checks: "For Flood Relief -
Animals"  I've been told this humane society is wonderful. Thanks for any
help you can offer them.

Another address: The Grand Forks Air Force Base Veterinary Clinic,
Grand Forks AFB, ND   58204  Put this message on checks: "For Flood
Victims' Pets"

                                                  For the Animals,

                                                  Jana, OKC

Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 13:14:04 -0400
>From: allen schubert <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: (US) (Fwd) Police Brutality at UC Davis
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

from private e-mail:
------- Forwarded Message Follows -------

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 21, 1997




Beaten Activists Charge
Police Brutality at UCD
News Conference Monday

     DAVIS, Ca. -- A major news conference has been called for 11 a.m. Monday
morning at the California Primate Research Center by a civil liberties group
that monitored what it will claim was the beating and brutalizing of
activists by University of California riot police during a demonstration
Sunday.

     Among those present at the news conference will be a 19-year-old activist
who was rushed the hospital with a possible broken arm -- incurred after a
UCD officer hit him with the full force of a billy club even though the
youth was already laying face down on the ground.

     Thirty-two activists were arrested, and at least half of them have reported
varying levels of brutal treatment by the UCD police. All were released by 1
a.m. Monday morning.

     A "pattern of conduct" indicating abusive, illegal, unethical behavior will
be outlined at the news conference, which will also reveal preliminary
evidence of police brutalities, mostly involving the use of clubs to hit
nonviolent protestors.

     "This was a peaceful demonstration, and when activists attempted to march
up to the Primate Center, police pushed, hit, bashed and injured them.
Television footage and our footage consistently and clearly show that," said
Crescenzo Vellucci, director of the California based Activist Civil
Liberties Committee and one of those arrested, and injured.

     "We will provide the news media with a list of cruel tactics used by the
police. Their activities have not been seen in many years in California --
they are, unlike the peaceful activists, inherently brutal," said Vellucci.

     Activists from throughout the Western U.S. participated in two-days of
workshops at the California Regional Primate Center at the University of
California, Davis Sunday concerning campaigns to stop animal experiments and
factory farming abuses.
-30-
     Contact: ACLC [phone]


Activist Civil Liberties Committee
PO Box 19515, Sacramento, CA 95819 [phone]

***************************
*  FREE TONY WONG!        *
*  FREE STACY SCHIERHOLZ! *
*  FREE JEFF WATKINS!     *
***************************


Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 10:25:15 -0700 (PDT)
>From: David J Knowles <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: [SA] Dolphins save drowning woman
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

>From The Electronic Telegraph - Monday, April 21st, 1997

Dolphins save drowning woman

A GROUP of dolphins saved a woman from drowning in the Indian Ocean near
Durban, a South African newspaper said yesterday. Doris Svorinic, 28, said
she was snorkelling when she panicked and swallowed water. The dolphins
nudged her all the way to safety, she said. A neighbour, Mark Frederic, 27,
who was diving nearby, failed to surface and was still missing at the weekend.

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 15:14:48 -0400 (EDT)
>From: [e-mail]
To: [e-mail]
Subject: undigest
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
MIME-version: 1.0
Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT


i'm unsure about how to undigest ar-news.

could you please send me info or
preform the service?
[e-mail]
thanks!
Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 15:23:26 -0400 (EDT)
>From: Pat Fish <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail], [e-mail]
Subject: Soy finds yet another use (Breast Implants) (US)
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII


Hard Copy reports that there is currently a study being conducted, in which
500 women desiring breast implants will get Soy instead of saline or
silicone.  HC also states there is still space for women to join the study.


Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:46:40 -0700 (PDT)
>From: David J Knowles <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: [US] Moms of the '90s Take On Environmental Threats
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"


>From The American News Service
(Forwarded with permission)

Moms of the '90s Take On Environmental Threats
By Nancy Weil

(ANS) -- Dierdre Tinker, mother of three, has her own version of a power
suit. On days she's meeting with Texas legislators, she reaches for her
foam-rubber cement kiln outfit.

One side is dirty, sooty, gray -- meant to show what happens when a cement
kiln smokestack burns hazardous waste without pollution control equipment.
The other side is spotless. Toilet brushes hang from it to suggest
"scrubbers" that companies use to reduce pollutants emitted into the air.

Her outfit speaks for her when she debates environmental cleanup with the
lawmakers.
        While national organizations such as the Sierra Club lobby
Washington on the Clean Air Act, thousands of "enviro-moms" such as Tinker
are waging their battles closer to home. In her case that means De Soto,
southwest of Dallas.

They may at times dress funny, but these moms are on a mission. Armed with
facts and figures, and driven by love and concern for their children,
they're the "heart and soul" of the environmental movement, said longtime
environmental educator Petey Giroux of Atlanta.

Without such women, "it would be a much less effective movement," said Ann
Notthoff, who works with grassroots groups as a senior planner in the San
Francisco office of the Natural Resources Defense Council. "I think that
women bring a very important perspective and approach to dealing with
environmental problems," she said.

Mothers across the country speak with passion about what motivates their
efforts.

"When I realized this cement plant had been burning hazardous waste for over
eight years and I did not know it, that made me a victim and I wasn't born
to be a victim," said Tinker -- like many other enviro-moms, a newcomer to
the arena of public activism. "I wanted to look into it because in the
meantime my children don't breathe so well."

Her three sons have asthma, one of them a severe case. Tinker believes
emissions from the cement kiln, nine miles by air from her home, are
contributing to the asthma. So she has helped rally her local and then
statewide PTA behind tougher laws regarding permits.

With the biannual state legislative session under way in Austin, Tinker and
her friend Becky Bornhorst have been driving three and a half hours to meet
lawmakers every few weeks. Bornhorst lives near the same cement plant, and
her 10-year-old daughter has had a cough -- since last September -- that she
can't shake.

Environmentally aware mothers like Tinker and Bornhorst go head-to-head with
lawmakers and corporate giants, waiting out the dog-years pace of government
and then sticking around to be sure that laws are enforced.

One of the original environmental moms is Lois Gibbs, whose neighborhood in
Niagara Falls, N.Y., was a chemical-waste dump in the 1940s and '50s.

In 1978, she sounded the call to arms at Love Canal, where dioxins and other
chemicals had seeped into basements in homes in her neighborhood, causing
cancer and birth defects. The nation's single worst environmental disaster
led to the creation of the federal Superfund to clean up hazardous waste sites.

In 1994, Occidental Chemical Corporation was ordered to pay New York $98
million over three years and assume wrongdoing in the catastrophe. Gibbs
became widely known for her work in the grassroots environmental movement
and in 1981 founded the Center for Health,
Environment, and Justice, based in Falls Church, Va. The center said it has
helped 8,000 community groups fight hazardous wastes.

Other moms were famous before they became environmental leaders. Actress
Meryl Streep started worrying about the use of pesticides on fruits and
vegetables that her children ate. It was apples -- sprayed with the chemical
Alar -- that helped trigger her concern eight years ago. So Streep and her
friend Wendy Gordon banded together some of their Connecticut neighbors and
soon persuaded the local supermarket to provide organic food.

>From their kitchen-table meetings arose Mothers & Others for a Livable
Planet, a national organization dedicated to helping consumers make
environmentally informed choices about the food they eat and the products
they use. Streep has said the New York-based group "can claim a good part of
credit" for the Food Quality Protection Act signed by President Clinton
last August. The Texas moms do their environmental work through the state
and local PTA, as well as with a neighborhood group called Downwinders at
Risk. Like other women engaged in similar fights across the nation, they
didn't intend to become leaders of a cause.

"We don't want to find out in the future that our kids have something
terribly wrong with them because of what's going on," said Bornhorst of the
hazardous waste burning.

⌐ COPYRIGHT The American News Service

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:46:43 -0700 (PDT)
>From: David J Knowles <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: [US] Environmental Business Investments May Be Looking Up
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"


>From The American News Service

Environmental Business Investments May Be Looking Up

(ANS) -- Over the past five or 10 years, investments in environmental
businesses have not profited as well as more traditional investments, admits
Gerard Hallaren, who manages Invesco's $20 million Environmental Services
Fund in Denver.

The average annual return for his fund over the past five years has been
only 2.8 percent, versus 22.9 percent for the Standard and Poor's 500, a
widely quoted index that gives a snapshot of a broad swath of American
businesses.

However, he said, "I see a much brighter picture going forward." Up until
about 1990 or so, people were pouring money into what he called "pie in the
sky investments" that were priced too high. Now, he thinks, environmental
investments are more realistic.

"We invest in what you might call pretty mundane things," said Hallaren, who
began managing Invesco's fund late last year. "People are going to have to
do something about garbage. They need clean water and air. I see this fund
not as a speculative thing, but as a solid, growth-oriented investment over
the long term."

Hallaren's fund has already begun to bear out his prediction: Last year, it
earned 17.8 percent for investors.

⌐ COPYRIGHT The American News Service

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:46:45 -0700 (PDT)
>From: David J Knowles <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: [US] In "Eco-Industrial Parks," One Company's Waste Is
  Another's Raw Material
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"


>From The American News Service

In "Eco-Industrial Parks," One Company's Waste Is Another's Raw Material
By Darren Waggoner

{(ANS) -- Imagine an industrial park in which all the products are designed
and manufactured in environmentally friendly ways. Not only that, but the
businesses are organized so that the waste produced by one company can be
used as raw material by another.

That's the dream being pushed toward reality by The Green Institute, a
public-private venture in Minneapolis that is setting up what it calls an
"ecological industrial park."

The Minneapolis project is one of about 20 similar projects operating
independently nationwide. The President's Council on Sustainable
Development, a project of Vice President Al Gore, acts as a clearinghouse
for information, sources of funding and ideas.

The idea goes far beyond the kind of recycling that most cities already
practice. In its ideal form, Green Institute executive director Michael
Krause and others like him envision an industrial system that would emulate
nature, where nothing is wasted.

Next to the site, The Green Institute has already created one related
business: the Re-Use Center, a 26,000-square-foot retail operation that
sells building materials salvaged from demolished properties. It employs 13
people and generates $350,000 in annual sales.

But the institute hopes to start construction within the year on a $4.5
million, 70,000-square-foot building that would house 15 to 20 more
businesses. Eventually, it hopes to expand to 200,000 square feet of
industrial space.

Krause has been talking to a variety of possible tenants for the new
building. One would open a paint remanufacturing plant that would recycle
old paint, some of it becoming high-quality caulk. Other possibilities
include a firm that helps companies find ways to cut their energy expenses,
one that makes canvas bags, and one that makes solar energy devices for home
and business use.

Krause especially likes the idea of businesses that can use each other's
waste. "That's almost always cheaper than using a virgin raw material," he said.

But the concept does not always succeed.

One of the nation's biggest monuments to dashed environmental hopes stands
in Rochester, N.Y. More than a decade ago, the state and county governments
spent $80 million on what was supposed to be a high-tech, state-of-the-art
recycling center to turn trash into useful products such as paving materials
and fuel to sell to the local electric utility.

As it turned out, few markets were found and the electric utility could not
burn the fuel efficiently. Today the plant is used primarily as a garbage
transfer station, sending waste to traditional landfills.

Overall, however, the concept of ecologically friendly industry seems to be
catching on. A handful of the nation's largest investment companies,
including Fidelity and Invesco, have set up mutual funds that invest
primarily in recycling and other environmentally oriented
businesses.

Londonderry, N.H., is another town hoping to attract some of this investment
by setting up an ecological park. Peter Lowitt, the town's director of
planning and economic development, said town leaders became interested in
the eco-park idea in 1995 after taxpayers had spent almost 10 years and more
than $13 million to clean up three toxic sites.

"We've learned a hard lesson. It helped us want to work harder with our
industries to create a model showing you can be good to your bottom line
while being good to the environment," Lowitt said.

"We want to show the industries that their waste stream can be a revenue
stream, as well as saving mightily on the cost of disposal."

Town leaders are negotiating with three prospective firms interested in
moving into a 100-acre site the town obtained by foreclosing for unpaid
taxes. Meanwhile, Yale University forestry students are analyzing the town's
industrial waste stream, a study that could help
Londonderry officials identify prospective businesses.

Unique to the Londonderry project is a legally binding covenant the
companies will be asked to sign, agreeing to account for all their waste and
try to make sure it is recycled.

"We hope the covenant will protect a company's investment. They'll know that
another company won't come in next door and put in a junkyard," Lowitt said.

Yet another eco-park is taking root in Brownsville, Texas. The local
economic development council studied more than 100 businesses, then gathered
information about the waste produced by 35 companies on both sides of the
U.S.-Mexico border.

With help from the Bechtel Corp., a high-tech research firm, a computer has
spit out a list of companies that might be good matches to use each other's
waste. "The final scenario has uncovered hundreds of potential matches,"
said Rick Luna, project manager.

There were some early glitches in the computer program. For example, it
could not distinguish between waste motor oils and waste food oils --
products that would have very different uses. However, when the report is
finished he expects to see opportunities for reuse of a variety of
cardboards, oils, plastics and solvents.

Eventually, Luna said, the Brownsville project will have about a dozen
businesses working together in the eco-park. But it is also hoping to expand
the idea of businesses feeding each other's waste to others without
necessarily having to pick up and relocate into the park.

In early March, Brownsville hosted a conference for eco-park developers
across the country. The keynote speaker, a vice president at Chaparral Steel
near Dallas, explained how his company takes junked cars and separates the
steel from the plastics and glass. Then, the company runs the metal through
a minimill to produce a top-quality steel. Chaparral is
also looking for ways to recycle the plastics and foams from those cars.

"The company's goal is to get to zero waste where everything that comes from
the cars finds a market," said Luna.

⌐ COPYRIGHT The American News Service

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 17:20:41 -0400 (EDT)
>From: [e-mail]
To: [e-mail]
Cc: [e-mail]
Subject: THS, pound seizure question
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>

Memorandum

To:  City Solicitor
       Medical Officer of Health
       City Auditor

>From:  Christine Archibald, Administrator, Neighbourhoods Committee, City
Clerk's, Corporate Services (2-7039)

Date:  April 7, 1997

Subject:  Toronto Humane Society

At its meeting on April 3, 1997, the Neighbourhoods Commitee gave
consideration to a report (March 17, 1997) from the respecting (sic) the
Toronto Humane Society.

The Committee also had before it a report (April 1, 1997) from Liz White,
Director, Animal Alliance of Canada and Barry Kent [MacKay], Programme
Manager, The Animal Protection Insitute (April 1, 1997

The Committee took the following action:

1:  Received the report (March 17, 1997) from the City Solicitor.

2:  Requested that the previously requested report to be prepared by the
Medical Officer of Health respecting a Complaints Procedure and Reporting
Requirements, be forwarded to the Committee for consideration at its next
meeting on April 30, 1997, for consideration as a deputation item, together
with the following material:

+ Audited Financial Statements for the year ended December 31, 1995 and
December 31, 1996

+ The By-laws of the Toronto Humane Society

+ The contract with the Toronto Humane Society and the City of Toronto with
the exception of any information respecting the security of the animals

3:  Requested the City Solicitor to report on the following recommendation
contained in the submission (April 1, 1997) from Liz White, Director, Animal
Alliance of Canada for consideration with the foregoing report/submissions at
the Committee's April 30, 1997 meeting:

"That the Committee and Council re-affirm the City's position that animals
sheltered by the Society will not sold or gifted for research purposes."

[Signed C. Archibald, Administrator]

____________________________________

All activists in the GTA should consider attending this meeting.

BKM.
Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 19:14:04 -0400
>From: allen schubert <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: (US) Web Site Offers Rare Look at Birds
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

from AP Wire page:
----------------------------
 04/21/1997 17:46 EST

 Web Site Offers Rare Look at Birds

 COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) -- The state Division of Wildlife has created a site
on the
 Internet for viewing one of Ohio's four nesting pairs of peregrine falcons.

 The falcons are nesting on the 41st floor of the Rhodes State Office Tower in
 Columbus. Four eggs in the nest are expected to hatch about May 9.

 The division each year installs a video camera at the nest that feeds a
signal to a
 television monitor in the lobby of the downtown office building.

 The agency has expanded the viewing to the World Wide Web where pictures
of the
 falcons' activities are updated every 10 seconds.

 Wildlife biologist Donna Daniel said the site provides a unique
opportunity for
 Internet users to watch falcon chicks hatching and feeding.

 ``Peregrines are elusive birds of prey. They typically nest in places
where they can't
 be seen easily such as tall buildings or rock cliffs,'' Daniel said Monday.

 The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the state of Ohio have placed the
birds on the
 endangered species list.

 The Web address for viewing the peregrine falcons is:
 www.dnr.state.oh.us/odnr/wildlife/falcon/peregrine.html
Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 19:15:13 -0400
>From: allen schubert <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: (US) U.S. Won't Extend EU Meat Deadline
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

from AP Wire page:
---------------------------
 04/21/1997 16:38 EST

 U.S. Won't Extend EU Meat Deadline

 WASHINGTON (AP) -- Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman said Monday the United
 States will not extend an April 30 deadline for reaching agreement with
the European
 Union on mutually acceptable meat inspection standards.

 The United States has warned the EU it will halt imports of as much as
$300 million
 in European meat products if agreement cannot be reached by the end of the
month.

 The threat was in response to the EU's introduction on April 1 of new
standards that
 are blocking about $50 million in U.S. poultry exports to the 15-nation
community.

 After European negotiators submitted new proposals, the United States
extended its
 April 15 deadline last week and scheduled new talks beginning Tuesday.

 Glickman told the annual meeting of the National Association of Agricultural
 Journalists the United States ``has given it two more weeks,'' but added
that after
 that, ``I would say there will be no more extensions.''
Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 19:32:59 -0400
>From: allen schubert <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: (US/CA) Web Notice -- Snow Geese
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

Just FYI...

At this URL:  http://north.audubon.org/
you can "track" Snow Geese on their migrations.  This may be of interest to
those who are especially concerned about the Snow Geese.
Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 21:45:16 -0400
>From: "Zoocheck Canada Inc." <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: Canada's Polar Bear Export Program
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

Zoocheck Canada Press Release dated April 17, 1997

+++

For Immediate Release
April 17, 1997

Canada's Forgotten Polar Bears: Study and Video Reveals Tragedy of Manitoba
Polar Bear Export Program

Approximately 40 wild-caught polar bears from the Churchill, Manitoba
region have been captured by Manitoba Natural Resources and shipped to zoos
around the world.

An investigation by national animal protection organization Zoocheck Canada
has revealed the tragic consequences of Manitoba's polar bear export program.

Despite assurances by government officials that the program has been
humane, Zoocheck Canada has uncovered numerous serious problems, including
the shipment of bears to grossly substandard zoos around the world; the
movement of polar bears from recipient zoos to other destinations; polar
bears exhibiting abnormal stereotypic behaviours; bears that have died or
are seriously ill; and the transfer of Canadian polar bears to a circus.

You are invited to a media conference to find out more about the Manitoba
Polar Bear Export Program, the kinds of conditions Canadian bears are now
subjected to in zoos around the world, and the recommendations proposed by
Zoocheck Canada to deal with the problems.

Copies of the Zoocheck Canada report <Canada's Forgotten Polar Bears: An
Examination of Manitoba's Polar Bear Export Program>, and videotape of
Canadian polar bears, will be available.

Date, Time & Location:

Lombard Hotel, Cambridge Room, 2 Lombard Place, Winnipeg
Friday April 18, 1997, 10:30 am

For more information, contact:

Zoocheck Canada [phone]

+++

The above-referenced press conference generated provincial and national
media coverage on the issue. In response, the Manitoba Minister of Natural
Resources promised to look into the problem, and other politicians
expressed an interest in taking on the issue.

Zoocheck Canada's report <Canada's Forgotten Polar Bears: An Examination of
Manitoba's Polar Bear Export Program> is available for $10.00 Canadian.




Zoocheck Canada Inc.
3266 Yonge Street, Suite 1729
Toronto, ON M4N 3P6
[phone]  Ph    [phone]  Fax
E-Mail:  [e-mail]
Web Site:  http://web.idirect.com/~zoocheck
Registered Charity No. 0828459-54
Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 21:53:24 -0400
>From: allen schubert <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: (US) May 1st DEADline!...take a second please!
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

from private e-mail:
--------------------------------
  "It is imperative to stop the slaughter" said Interior Secretary Bruce
Babbitt.  But the killing of buffalo goes on.

On May 1, all bison still outside of Yellowstone National Park, including
those tested, marked and tagged as being brucellosis-free, must either
return to the park or be shot.

Why? Because soon the cattle will be trucked in to stock Forest Service
grazing allotments. Bison killing has slowed in recent weeks as the
winter's snowpack melted to expose forage, and bison have not needed to
move so far.
But when the May 1st deadline arrives, we expect a full-on massacre of the
remaining animals.


Join us letting public officials know that the public is outraged!
Sign on to this simple statement....

I am outraged about the slaughter of the Yellowstone bison.
On May 1st, I will be wearing a black arm band to show solidarity with the
last wild buffalo herd in the United States!
The world will be watching Montana on May 1st to see if the massacre stops!
Signed,


to sign on send your name and state to stop-the [e-mail]
by April 28th


We will compile the letter and names and forward it appropriate officials.
We will inform the press just how many folks are outraged across the nation!
We need at least two names for each bison that was murdered!

Montana Department of Livestock refuses Park Service offers to haze buffalo
back into park boundaries.  Bulls that couldn't possibly transmit
brucellosis
(through the placenta or milk) are being killed. So the Tokala Society of the
Oglala Lakota Nation is helping to patrol the border and keep the state of
Montana from killing any more bison..  They will be working on the
1st...keep them in your thoughts.

Please pass this on! It only takes a sec!!!

Thank you,
For the Earth,
su



Quotable QUOTES:

Audubon article: "By late March more than 2,000 bison - nearly two-thirds
of the park herd - had died, caught in a political crossfire of a dispute
about a disease called brucellosis and about who should decide the fate of
America's last wild bison herd."


Rosalie Little Thunder, Lakota elder says, "The killing ... and the
laughing of the killers...its the Phil Sheridan nightmare all over again".
(Note: Phil Sheridan ordered and participated in the 1800's slaughter of
millions of buffalo to bring the Indian people to their knees.)  "This
slaughter is the result of that same mentality,  combined with political
paralysis. Common sense and direct action is desperately needed to save
what's left of the herd."

For more information about the plight of the Yellowstone Bison
check out this web site
http://www.wildrockies.org/bison



Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 21:55:25 -0400
>From: allen schubert <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: (US) Time may be running out
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

Posted for (and replies to) "Bob Kirk" <[e-mail]>:
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Looking for a good home for the following animals:
>
>Kodiak Grizzly - 2 year old female.  Raised from a cub, manageable.
>
>African Lion - 2 year old male.  Raised from a cub, manageable, declawed
and
>frisky.  Can
>                       use lead and collar.
>
>Siberian Tiger - 2 year old male.  Very passive, manageable, use a lead.
>
>All have been bottle feed.
>
>All come with their own cages.
>
>Must come to Lewisburg, West Virginia to pick up the animals.
>
>All are in good health and good hands at this time.
>
>I am acting as a go between for the owner.  We realize (and have made
>queries) about the value
>of each animal.  He has kept and feed them for more than a year.  He would
>like to sell them by
>May 1, 1997.
>
>If you or anyone you know would be interested in them you can contact me
by:
>Calling [phone] (Work) Mon. - Fri. 0830-1700 EST and ask for Bob
Kirk
>or [phone] (Home) after 1700.
>E-mail, [e-mail]
>Write to, PO Box 801, Fairlea, WV 24902.
>
>Please contact me for any more information.
>
>                  Thank You, Bob Kirk
>
>

Any help with other contacts will help


Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 23:06:10 -0400
>From: "H. Morris" <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: veg-nyc: NYC Lockdown for Chimps
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"


>Hey you crazy animal rights freaks!!!
>
>Today at a protest at NYU to demand that 100 chimps which NYU has tortured
>and maimed, some for nearly 30 years, be transferred to a sanctuary rather
>than to notorious toxicologist Fred Coulston, killer of the chimp Jello
>(DEATH 1/97).
>
>At first, we were around the corner to the main entrance to the building
>atop which a "secret:" animal research lab is being built.  But the police
>wouldn't arrest us, presumably becauseNYU did not want the negative
>publicity.  I mean, four people were locked down with pipes, and they did
>nothing. In fact, there was only 3 or 4 cops total!  After some discussion
>and two hours later, the lockdowners removed themselves and we walked to
>the main entrance, where two people sat down and the lockdowners blocked
>the entrance and relinked!! Cops were doing NOTHING! Of course, once we
>bblocked the entrance, things started getting going! Cops, students,
>crowds, MEDIA (Ch 2, 5, 9, NY Times, and NY Post along with a number of
>local papers).  Goo dchants, great energy, lots of support from
>passerbys--handed out about 2000 flyers. The cops, who recognized alot of
>us from FFF, didnt want to cut through the pipes, and there was a long time
>when they begged those locked down to release themselves.  Of course, they
>didnt for a while, and those of us who were sitting around them
>agreed....then the University agreed to let us speak to the VP of the
>school.Those locked down agreed tounlock themselves, with the condition
>that if the VP was not open to listening, and if the meeting turned out to
>be a sham, we would be back in greater force, and soon.
>
>I wont go into the details of the meeting, which was to my mind a joke, but
>suffice to say that WE'LL BE BACK.  Perhaps someone else who was there
>wants to give some sense of the meeting?
>
>THe move to the front of the building, as well as the decision  by some of
>those who joined the sitdown, was unplanned.  So good things do come about
>even when they're spur of the moment!  We got a meeting with the 2nd in
>command, and let him know that we are serious and will not go away.
>Congrats to Wetlands for organizing a great demo--James, Chris, Olga, and
>others!
>
>Hillary
>
>
Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 23:14:09 -0400
>From: Wyandotte Animal Group <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: Bear Exhibitor Charged
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

A man had two bears at the Gibraltar Trade Center, in Mt. Clemens, MI, this
weekend offering pictures with the bears.  The bears had all their teeth and
claws and weres restrained only by a leash.  No muzzles were used.  Someone
called the police and a background check was done on the exhibitor.  His
license for having the bears had expired.  He is currently facing charges
related to "possessing unmuzzled bears."  The bears are currently housed at
the Detroit Zoo.  No permanent arrangments have yet been made on where the
bears will stay.



Jason Alley
Wyandotte Animal Group
[e-mail]

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 23:18:38 -0400
>From: Wyandotte Animal Group <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: Bear Exhibator Charged Update
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

Just found out:

The exhibator was none other than Sam Mazollo, the famous wrestling bears
goon.  His charges are "possessing unmuzzled bears" and public endangerment.

Jason Alley
Wyandotte Animal Group
[e-mail]

Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 20:19:50 -0700
>From: Andrew Gach <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: Elephants in peril
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

Elephants doomed if ivory trade restarts

Reuter Information Service

LONDON (April 21, 1997 8:02 p.m. EDT) - Elephants in southern Africa and
Asia could be wiped out by poachers if a small group of countries
succeed in overturning a ban on the international ivory trade, an
environmental group said Tuesday.

Trading in ivory is banned under the Convention on International Trade
in Endangered Species (CITES) but Botswana, Namibia, and Zimbabwe,
backed by South Africa and Mozambique, plan to petition the 134-member
CITES to lift the 1989 ban.

The Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) said the proposal could
spell doom for the elephant population.

"The ban on international trade in ivory has been a huge success.
Elephant herds across Africa and Asia which were on the verge of
disappearing have started to recover," EIA Director Dave Currey said in
a statement.

"Even a partial relaxation of the ban would send a message to poachers
that ivory trade is back. This would mean disaster for elephant
populations across the two continents."

South Africa, Namibia and Zimbabwe all have large elephant populations
which they say often devastate their environment. Herds are often culled
in an attempt to keep numbers down.

The countries hope to convince governments and conservationists that the
ban merely drives trade underground. They plan to propose that ivory
collected from periodic culls be auctioned under tight controls instead.

Botswana says its ivory stockpile is the result of natural deaths and
ivory seized from poachers and illegal traders. Officials say they have
a Japanese buyer for the ivory.

A similar move by Botswana in 1992, involving another buyer, was voted
down.

The EIA and other environmental groups point out that the African
elephant population fell by more than 50 percent in the 10 years before
the ban -- mostly due to ivory poachers.

The EIA said it had evidence that poachers were waiting for the ban to
be lifted.

"In February of this year two EIA investigators carried hidden
microphones and cameras during discussions with Namibian traders which
indicated that large amounts of black market ivory from neighboring
Angola are available for sale," it said.

The EIA added that sources in India had reported smugglers stockpiling
ivory in anticipation of a rise in profits.
Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 20:31:47 -0700
>From: Andrew Gach <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: Manslaughter - #2
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

Parents of girl who suffered brain damage from vaccine get settlement

Kansas City Star

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (April 21, 1997 00:43 a.m. EDT) -- The vaccine was
supposed to keep Taylor Simmons healthy. Instead it damaged her brain
and destroyed her chance for a normal life.

The girl, now 4, is so hyperactive and oblivious to danger that she
cannot be left alone for a second. She will require round-the-clock care
for the rest of her life.

"She's certainly one of the most extreme behavior cases I've seen," said
Colorado rehabilitation specialist Mark Litvin, who designs programs to
care for children like Taylor.

Acknowledging the severity of Taylor's brain damage, attorneys with the
U.S. Justice Department agreed this week to a settlement that could pay
almost $50 million to Taylor and her family over her lifetime. A
department spokesman said he could not discuss details of the
settlement.

Taylor's parents have received the first check, for $500,000. They asked
that their city of residence not be named because of concerns about
publicity about the money.

The money comes from a fund set up by Congress in 1988 to compensate
people injured after receiving childhood vaccinations. Most claims, like
Taylor's, involve adverse reactions to vaccinations for pertussis. The
disease, commonly called whooping cough, can lead to convulsions,
pneumonia, brain damage or death.

About 5,000 claims have been filed, and the fund has paid out more than
$750 million, according to the National Vaccine Information Center in
Virginia.

"As a result of these vaccinations, Taylor's quality of life was totally
destroyed," said Olathe lawyer Greg Kincaid, who represents the Simmons
family. "Her parents have not had a reasonable night's sleep since this
happened."

Taylor is an inquisitive whirlwind of motion. She gets into and out of
everything and sleeps only three or four hours at a time.

A plate of food set in front of her will be splattered on the floor.

She can remove window screens and will careen wildly around a parking
lot, oblivious to moving cars.

"Our house has to look like Fort Knox," said Taylor's father, Steve
Simmons.

She can only be taught one on one.

Steve and Tracy Simmons say they are angry about what happened to their
daughter. They are angry that the batch of vaccine that damaged their
daughter was not recalled by the government after several other children
had fatal reactions.

Since then, the Food and Drug Administration approved a different
vaccine that it says causes far fewer side effects. But that vaccine,
which has been used in Japan since 1981, came too late for the
Simmonses.

"The day she got that shot, our lives died," said Steve Simmons.

Taylor was 4 months old when she was vaccinated. She immediately passed
out and remained semiconscious for the rest of the day, Steve Simmons
said. At 3 a.m. the next day her parents found her having seizures and
called for an ambulance.

Doctors assured them that the seizures were prompted by a high fever, a
not uncommon problem for children.

Things were fine until Taylor was 7 months old, when she had another
seizure and quit breathing. Doctors prescribed drugs to control the
seizures.

The seizures started coming once a month, but Taylor, the Simmonses'
first child, appeared to be developing normally. She was sitting up and
crawling at appropriate ages and was starting to talk.

The seizures increased in frequency until she was having up to 15 a day.
Some lasted for more than an hour. Her development slowed and then
regressed. She could no longer speak words she had known a few months
before.

Doctors tried medication after medication to control the seizures. The
Simmonses lost track of how many emergency room trips they made.

"The paramedics knew us on a first-name basis," Tracy Simmons said.

Taylor has required physical, occupational and speech therapy since she
was 15 months old.

All along, her parents suspected that the vaccination had something to
do with Taylor's problems, but doctors told them that wasn't the case.

Then Steve Simmons saw a report on a television news magazine about
problems associated with diphtheria-pertussis-tetanus vaccinations.

"We always knew that something happened, but we never had the
information to validate what we believed," Steve Simmons said.

Finally their pediatrician told them that yes, Taylor's problems could
have been caused by the vaccination.

The television program they saw was due in part to the efforts of the
National Vaccine Information Center, which was founded in 1982 by
parents of vaccine-damaged children.

Its executive director, Kathi Williams, said an earlier television
documentary led her and other parents to form the group.

The group strives to educate the public about possible problems with
vaccines. It has helped establish the compensation fund, set up a
central system to report vaccine problems and lobbied for the safer
vaccine.

Williams said that despite thousands of anecdotal stories and the
willingness of the government to recognize the problem by paying
compensation, many doctors do not believe it has been proved that the
vaccinations are responsible for problems.

Still, others in the medical community believe that a small percentage
of people receiving vaccinations suffer some type of harmful reaction.
People who have studied the topic say there are no definitive studies on
how widespread the problem is.

According to an FDA report several years ago, one out of every 309,000
pertussis vaccinations resulted in some type of nerve damage.

The only large government-financed study, in 1979, found that one out of
every 875 shots resulted in a seizure or collapse caused by shock,
Williams said.

Litvin says he deals with children around the country with serious
physical and emotional problems related to vaccinations. He has designed
a plan to care for Taylor for the rest of her life.

Such intensive care is expensive and demanding. Litvin said he has seen
many families torn apart by the emotional strain of caring for a child
like Taylor.

"These parents need help," Litvin said. "They are basically worn out all
the time. Everything they do with her is stressful and demanding."

--By Tony Rizzo, Kansas City Star
Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 20:29:59 -0700
>From: Andrew Gach <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: Manslaughter - #1
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
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Article

Pennsylvania couple in court for not giving daughter medical treatment

The Associated Press

HOLLIDAYSBURG, Pa. (April 21, 1997 1:07 p.m. EDT) -- A couple who
believed that prayer can heal should not be prosecuted in the death of
their teen-age daughter because they did not intend for her to die,
their attorney said Monday.

Lorie and Dennis Nixon of Altoona went on trial on involuntary
manslaughter charges in the death of 16-year-old Shannon Nixon last
year. She died of a heart attack brought on by untreated diabetes. The
couple, who belong to the Faith Tabernacle Church, also lost a son to
illness several years earlier.

"This case is not about the prosecution of criminals. This case is about
the persecution of well-intended, well-meaning parents," defense
attorney Steven Passarello told jurors in Blair County Court.

District Attorney William Haberstroh said doctors will testify this week
that "there is absolutely no reason why this child should have died."

State law requires parents to protect children who are younger than 18,
he said. He pointed out that Shannon had been to a doctor as a
requirement for her drivers' license and had seen a dentist.

Shannon had complained to her parents for several days that she wasn't
feeling well, she vomited repeatedly and she was constantly thirsty, the
parents told police at the time. She asked for a healing ceremony from
the church rather than a doctor. She was unconscious for several hours
before she died, with a minister and her parents praying over her.

Five years earlier, the couple's 8-year-old son, Clayton, died of an
inner-ear infection. That time, they pleaded no contest and were
sentenced to probation. They also were ordered to perform community
service in a hospital at the request of Haberstroh, who wanted them to
see the positive effects of medicine.

But no hospital would accept them as volunteers, so they performed their
community service elsewhere, he said.

The couple has eight surviving children and Mrs. Nixon, 44, is pregnant
again. Haberstroh has said he would not seek more than a year in prison
if they are convicted.

The Nixons are the latest members of the Faith Tabernacle to go up
against the state in the treatable deaths of their own children. The
Nixons are fighting powerful foes -- doctors, courts and other religions
-- by clinging to the belief that prayer rather than medical treatment
can heal.

Two other members of the Philadelphia-based sect have been convicted, in
1983 and 1992, of involuntary manslaughter in central Pennsylvania for
allowing their toddlers to die.

In 1991 in suburban Philadelphia, five more children died during a
measles outbreak, and in the 1970s, a Faith Tabernacle couple in
suburban Philadelphia lost five children before age 2 to untreated
cystic fibrosis.

Other churches also have had members prosecuted on similar grounds,
including an Albany, Ore., member of the Church of the First Born was
convicted of criminally negligent homicide a year ago in the death of
his 7-year-old son from a treatable form of leukemia.

In church Sunday, pastor Charles Nixon told the biblical tale of David
and Goliath in his sermon as his daughter-in-law listened. Mrs. Nixon
sat calmly in a navy blue hat and maternity jumper flanked by female
relatives as her father-in-law spoke.

The biblical David "left the battle in the hands of the Lord, so he
didn't need to worry about winning it," the pastor told the 80 or so
worshipers.

Called "baby killers" by some, the Faith Tabernacle refuses to elaborate
beyond pamphlets in the church foyer about its beliefs.

"It's just beyond me how somebody can watch a child die and not do
anything about it," said Rosemary Smith, 61, as she watched her two
grandchildren play Sunday afternoon from her porch around the corner
from the church.

Smith, a Roman Catholic, grew teary-eyed as she described watching Faith
Tabernacle children play every day behind the church, where they also
attend school, and wondering, "Who's going to be the next one?"

The number of faiths that advocate prayer over medicine is shrinking,
said J. Gordon Melton, director of the Institute for the Study of
American Religions in Santa Barbara, Calif. Many popped up around the
turn of the century as a backlash against modern medicine.

Pamphlets say the Faith Tabernacle Congregation is 100 years old this
year and has "stations" from New Jersey to Africa. During the Sunday
service, Nixon read a wish list of anonymous prayers from churchgoers.

"Sister asks to be remembered for healing a condition in her leg," Nixon
recited. "Brother has a request that God will take care of Dennis and
Lorie and their family. Brother asks for grace in dealing with a
headache and sickness."

--By Casey Jones, The Associated Press
Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 20:33:46 -0700
>From: Andrew Gach <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Subject: Manslaughter (or womanslaughter?) #3
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
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Hysterectomy should be last resort

Reuter Information Service

LONDON (April 20, 1997 9:02 p.m. EDT) - Most British doctors think
hysterectomiesshould only be done as a last resort but the operation is
still one of the most frequent, a survey published on Monday found.

The survey, by Meditex, also found broad disagreement among doctors as
to which drugs should be used as alternatives to hysterectomy for
treating menorrhagia -- excessive menstrual bleeding.

"There has been concern for some time, both within the medical
profession and outside, about rising rates of hysterectomy, which appear
to be continuing despite the availability of alternative surgical
treatments," said Angela Coulter of the Kings Fund medical charity.

A statement released by a group of doctors concerned about treatment of
menorrhagia said hysterectomy was one of the most frequently performed
operations in the Western world. "On current rates at least one-fifth of
women living in England and Wales will have a hysterectomy before the
age of 65," it said.

"In the United States of America and Scotland, this surgical procedure
is second only to another controversial operation experienced wholly by
women -- Caesarean section."

Two-thirds of the 73,000 hysterectomies (removal of the uterus and
sometimes the ovaries) carried out in England in 1992-93 were to treat
menorrhagia.

The survey found most doctors did not know about the most effective
drugs available for treating menorrhagia, which include mefenamic acid
and tranexamic acid.

One of the doctors in the group, Dr. Sally Hope, said less-educated
women were much more likely to have hysterectomies. "Better eduction for
women about period problems tends to lead to fewer hysterectomies, as if
the other options are explained and tried most women prefer not to have
surgery," she said.

Last month a team at London's Royal Free Hospital reported in the Lancet
medical journal that women treated with electrosurgery or laser to
remove some of the surface of the uterus, a procedure known as TCRE,
were just as happy with the outcome as women who had hysterectomies.

Time spent being operated on, blood loss and time to recovery were all
lower with TCRE.



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