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                        OF NOTE...
                        News to Use

Vol. III, Issue 59                                April 15, 1994
Earl Appleby, Jr., Editor                         CURE, Ltd.

                        Addictions

"Gloria Jones is a smoker who is glad to see 'no smoking' signs. 'I
smoke so much I can't stand it myself,' she says. Bans on smoking
force her to do what she can't do on her own. 'It helps me to cut
down.' Jones, 47. of Jamaica, NY is among 1,007 adults who took part
in a USA Today/CNN/Gallup telephone survey on smoking habits and
attitudes. (A Result of all the Huffing is a Little Less Puffing, USA
Today, 3/16/94) ABLEnews Editor's Note: For more data from that survey
and others, see Huff and Puff in the upcoming April ABLEnews Review.

"Listen closely and you can almost hear the welcome whoosh of momentum
gathering behind broad new smoking controls. The broadest so far: a
federal proposal to outlaw smoking in almost everyone of the nation's
public buildings...When it comes to public health and common sense, no
other proposals can offer so much. What about smokers' rights? The
proposed ban would permit smoking indoors in rooms with separate
ventilation. Beyond that, smokers have no real rights at all...For
eight years, studies have shown a connection between secondhand smoke
and ill health in non-smokers. Allowing smokers to continue to smoke
in enclosed public places is unconscionable; indeed, it is lethal. Ban
the practice. And ban it soon." (Curb Smoking in Public, editorial,
USA Today, 3/25/94)

"Keep out of factories, offices, and workplaces. Stay away from
poolrooms, bingo halls, and union meetings. Stay away from nightclubs,
taverns, malls, and bowling allies; from bus depots and airports; from
hotels and motels. If this were about anything but smoking, it would
be laughable. Substitute another group for 'smokers' and the uproar
would be enormous...Let's take a look at the bill. It's an example of
social engineering on a vast scale-- requiring smoking bans in all
buildings but homes that are regularly entered by 10 or more people a
week...Polls report bans are not the public's choice. Polls from
anti-smoking groups report two of three Americans prefer smoking and
non-smoking sections...Such massive intervention into the private
lives of adults recalls the extremism of Prohibition. That should
remain the last such national crusade." --Brennan Dawson, vice
president, Tobacco Institute. (Reject This 'Prohibition,' Dawson,
op-ed, USA Today, 3/25/94)


                        AIDS Addenda

"It is clear that in 1994 if you are a fireman, policeman, or a
paramedic and choose not to deal with those who have AIDS, then you
have to find a new line of work." --Bruce Flannery, education manager,
Philadelphia Action AIDS. "AIDS discrimination is illegal and it is
wrong. People with HIV and AIDS should not be afraid to call 911."
--Nan Feyler, executive director, AIDS Law Project of Philadelphia. In
its first settlement of an AIDS discrimination case under the
Americans with Disabilities Act, the Justice Department is requiring
more than 2,000 emergency workers to treat HIV-infected people.
(Justice Department Requires Emergency Workers to Treat Those with
HIV, Baltimore Sun, 3/22/94)

According to a study released today by the Orphan Project, by the end
of the decade, between 72,000 and 125,000 children will be left
without a mother because of AIDS. In Washington, DC--one of the
hardest hit cities--1,100 to 2,200 children will lose their mothers to
HIV-related deaths by the year 2000. But New York City, which should
see 30,000 minors orphaned by AIDS tops the list. The
estimates--regarded as conservative--do not reflect fathers who die
AIDS-related deaths. (A Legacy of AIDS: Orphans, Barbara Vobejda,
Washington Post, 3/29/94)

                        Cancer Chronicles

"They just have not been in compliance with the guidelines[for
auditing researchers' data and reporting irregularities]. The
organization is not meeting its responsibilities in this area." -
-Bruce Chabner, director, division of cancer treatment, National
Cancer Institute, on the National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel
Project. NCI officials are investigating allegations of fraud in the
wake of reports that a Canadian physician apparently falsified data in
a study that led to a 1985 article claiming lumpectomy was as
effective as mastectomy in treating breast cancer. Now questionable
data in a second study involving another Canadian researcher has been
discovered. (Head of Breast Cancer Study Asked to Step Down;
Additional Patients Barred, David Brown, Washington Post, 3/30/94)

                        Care Less

"Paul Shellito's surgical practice at Massachusetts General Hospital
often stretches from 7 AM to 8 PM, and he handles a full load of
emergency cases on weekends. In his spare time, he teaches at Harvard
Medical School and publishes research on colon surgery. Yet a powerful
insurer has been urging Sr. Shellito to pick up the pace. To hold down
costs, Tufts Associated Health Plans, which hospitalizes more than 800
patients a year at MGH, wants doctors throughout the elite teaching
hospital to discharge patients faster. Some physicians squawked at
first. But after more than a year...even hard-liners such as Dr.
Shellito have largely conceded the fight. "It's changed the way I
practice,' he says. 'Tufts is very good at finding ways to get
patients out of the hospital sooner...They've put the monkey on my
back. Now, I'm haggling with my patients about going home the evening
of the day I see them.' The lives of doctors at many prestigious
teaching hospitals are changing under powerful pressure from health
maintenance organizations and other insurers that run 'managed care'
cost control programs." (Health Plans Force Even Elite Hospitals to
Cut Costs Sharply, George Anders, Wall Street Journal, 3/8/94)

                        Child's Play

"Several crayons advertised as safe, non-toxic, and school- quality
pose a lead poisoning threat to children, says the Consumer Product
Safety Commission. Eleven brands of crayons, all imported from China
and usually sold in discount stores, were found to contain lead and
are being recalled...Lead poisoning can: Cause brain damage. Retard
mental and physical development. Reduce attention span...Imported
crayons are an estimated 3%-5% of the %130 million US crayon market.
Currently, the CPSC knows of only one case, in Arizona, linking a
child with high blood lead levels with a recalled crayon." (Imported
Crayons Are Lead Threat, Michelle Healy, USA Today, 4/6/94) ABLEnews
Editor's Note: For a complete listing of the hazardous Chinese
crayons, see Color Me Toxic in the upcoming April ABLEnews Review.

                        Doctor, Doctor

"Yesterday was one of the most important days in Brian Eischenberg's
life, so he came to school prepared--with champagne and a cellular
phone. Would Eischenberg and his girlfriend, Debbie Taurek, both
fourth-year medical students at Georgetown University, spend the next
five years or so working in Michigan, Minnesota, or Southern
California? Until noon, only a computer knew their fate. After months
of interviews and hospital visits, 14,207 fourth-year medical students
in the United States submitted preference lists last month for
internship and residency training programs...Hospitals submitted their
own ranked lists of the applicants. Then the National Residency
Matching Program computer program went to work, matching students and
slots, and at noon EST yesterday, medical schools across the country
handed out the results. For many medical students, Match Day is the
most stressful part of medical school...Like the NFL football draft,
there are no choices: Once a student matches, that is where he or she
is expected to go to work." (Young Doctors and Hospitals Matched,
Brooke Masters, Washington Post, 3/17/94)

                        Family Affair

"The Chicago police swept into 219 North Keystone Avenue last Tuesday
looking for drugs, and found children instead. There were 19 in all.
Lying two deep on a pair of dirty mattresses. Or sprawled on the
apartment's cold floor, among food scraps, cigarette butts, and human
excrement. Most were in dirty diapers or underwear; one boy,
subsequently found to have cerebral palsy, wore bruises, belt marks,
and cigarette burns on his body. Two of the smallest children, reads
the police report, were awake, sharing a neck bone with a dog. As the
police removed the children from the residence, one pleaded to a
female cop, 'Will you be my mommy? I want to go home with you.'"...At
a prayer breakfast last week with Mother Teresa, President Clinton
cited headlines about the tragedy and wondered aloud: 'Not in Calcutta
but in Chicago.' The Calcutta remark was grimly amusing to Alex
Kotlowitz, who wrote There Are No Children Here...Each time that
particular wheel is rediscovered, 'we say, 'Oh, my God.' And then
nothing is done.'...Sterling Ryder, head of the social-services
agency...agrees with Kotlowitz: 'The President doesn't understand what
the conditions are in the inner cities. In many respects children in
the United States are in worse shape than children in Third World
countries.'" (Calcutta, Illinois, David Van Biema, Time, 2/14/94)

"The most important issue has been joined. A suit filed in New Jersey
by the National Organization of Women, the state American Civil
Liberties Union, and others claims that mothers on welfare have a
constitutional right to additional payments for however many other
children they choose to have, in or out of wedlock. The suit argues,
in effect, that the state law denying welfare increases for babies
born to women already on welfare violates the Constitution's 'privacy'
right because it intrudes upon 'the most personal of decisions:
whether or not to have children.' Because the law attempts to
'influence' family planning and reduce rates of conception and
childbirth, it burdens the welfare mother's 'fundamental rights to
make decisions about family composition, conception, and childbirth
without undue governmental intrusion.' The conclusion is Orwellian: If
government withdraws from subsidizing illegitimacy, it is being
intrusive. But the suit is right about one thing. The law does involve
the state in subsidizing behavior the state 'disfavors.' It is about
time." (Orwell in New Jersey, George Will, op-ed, Newsweek, 3/21/94)
ABLEnews Editor's Note: Like many questions, this one has more than
two sides. What concerns me primarily is not the controverted
"constitutional rights" of welfare mothers but the incontrovertible
natural needs of children--regardless of the circumstances of their
conception. Punishing children (perhaps with induced intrauterine
death) is too dear a price to pay to hypocritically stigmatize their
mothers for the natural outcome of activities our media and
marketplace glamorize.

"If you were trying to create a fantasy to fit every stereotype about
welfare, or for that matter about the government, you couldn't have
scripted a more incendiary plot. Imagine this one: In Massachusetts,
the government has been paying for fertility drugs given to Medicaid
patients. The same society concerned about the number of children born
in and to poverty, the same government trying to get mothers and
children off AFDC, paid to help poor parents conceive more children.
No wonder the story made headlines and made heads shake." (Poverty and
Fertility, Ellen Goodman, op-ed, Baltimore Sun, 3/22/94) ABLEnews
Editor's Note: Note how Goodman has subtly twisted the question of
subsidizing fertility drugs for welfare recipients into a defacto
challenge of the rights of the poor to have children period.

"There it was again, tucked in a newspaper column by Keith Geiger,
president of the National Education Association: "It takes a whole
village to raise a child.' All adults, Geiger argued, including those
with no children of their own, should take an active interest in at
least one child. This slogan, born in Africa, has gone mainstream,
becoming the darling of politicians and authors. It is pronounced
reverentially from podiums and shimmers in italics from the
cream-colored pages of manuscripts. In a country that holds families
almost exclusively responsible for raising children, it has captured
the public's imagination because so many families appear to be
failing." (Of Kids and Community, Laura Stepp, Washington Post, 3/28/94)

                        Food for Thought

"They gathered last week outside supermarkets and shopping malls in
Chicago, Minneapolis, Washington, and other US cities, carrying signs
and posing for TV cameras in goofy-looking cow suits. A young woman in
Manhattan dumped a bucket of milk onto a frozen sidewalk. A man in
Madison, WI dragged plastic white milk cartons stamped with the skull
and crossbones up the steps of the state capitol. Two dozen
demonstrators marched in front of Atlanta's Toco Hills shopping center
with a banner that read STOP THE 'FRANKENFOOD'--SAVE THE COWS. What
roused these '60s-style protestors was a quintessentially '90s issue:
whether a genetically engineered hormone that went on sale last week
after nearly 10 years of legal wrangling threatens the safety of
American milk. The hormone, a natural protein found in cows, is being
artificially manufactured in vats of genetically altered bacteria.
When cows are regularly given extra doses of the hormone, their milk
production can rise as much as 15%. Scientists call the chemical
bovine somatotropin (BST) or, more simply, bovine growth hormone
(BGH), and it is marketed under the trade name, Posilac." (Brave New
World of Milk, Philip Elmer- Dewitt, Time, 2/14/94)

"Lost in the news article of food-borne illness ['A Disease That's a
Bite Away,' February 13] is the most effective way to keep our meat
supply free of disease-causing E. coli organisms: irradiation of fresh
meat and poultry products in conjunction with hygienic practices...No
matter what the level of federal expenditure might be, we will not be
able to eliminate naturally occuring pathogens through inspection. On
the other hand, irradiation--the use of ionizing energy on foods--is a
safe means of breaking the cycle of food-borne disease. It is used on
many kinds of foods in more than 30 countries." --Manfred Kroeger,
professor of food sciences, Pennsylvania State University. (Breaking
the Cycle of Food-Borne Disease, Kroger, letter-editor, WP, 3/7/94)

"Dr. Stuart M. Berger never actually claimed that he would live past
100; he merely wrote that he knew how to do it. He was an expert on
youthfulness, having reincarnated himself once already while still
living: turning from a fat, lonely, obscure kid from Brooklyn into a
trim, rich, famous practitioner in the exciting new medical specialty
of celebrity nutrition. His expertise in stuffing vegetables into
'world-renowned artists, musicians, intellectuals, professional
athletes, and members of the ruling families of several continents'
led to the popularity of his 'Southampton Diet.' This was followed in
1985 by the huge success of 'Dr. Berger's Immune Power Diet,' which
cleverly repackaged the same mounds of steamed broccoli as a
preventive for almost everything that could go wrong with the human
body. Among the intractable conditions he claimed he could treat with
diet and vitamin therapy were cancer, high blood pressure, arthritis,
premenstrual syndrome, and that all-purpose bugaboo of modern
medicine, 'weakened immune system.'...It must have come as a shock to
his devotees to read that Dr. Berger had died in his sleep in his
sleep in his Manhattan apartment at the age of 40... Even more
upsetting, presumably, was that the body weighed 365 pounds. If you
can't trust the nutrition columnist for the New York Post, where are
you going to turn for advice?" (The World's Biggest Diet Doctor, Jerry
Adler, op-ed, Newsweek, 3/21/94)

"On animal rights, Alice Walker, author of 'The Color Purple,' is
neither a crusader or a polemicist. She's chosen a more demanding
calling: storyteller. On one level, her 1986 tale, 'Am I Blue?', is a
meditation on the life of a fenced-in horse and, on another, a
condemnation of violence to animals. The California state board of
education recently dropped the Walker story from reading comprehension
tests for high school sophomores. 'It might be viewed as advocating a
particular nutritional lifestyle,' decreed the board's president,
Marion McDowell. Besides--horror of horrors--'Am I Blue?' is
'anti-meat eating.'" (Seeing Subversiveness in Diversity, Colman
McCarthy, op-ed, Washington Post, 3/29/94)

                   Health Care Plans and Pans

"Slowly but surely, Bill Clinton's health care plan is headed for the
triage unit. Joining the growing list of doctors, economists, and
business leaders voicing objections to Clinton's proposals is Pat
Moynihan, the influential chairman of the Senate Finance
Committee...Like Clinton, Moynihan wants a system that provides
universal coverage...The question is how to pay for it...The
Administration would force most employers to pay 80% of the costs of
health care premiums...But small companies, and an increasing number
of medium and large ones, contend that such mandates could bankrupt
them. In an attempt to accommodate these concerns, the White House
proposes 15 separate rates of medical-premium costs determined by
company size and employee wages. These differences, Moynihan argues
caustically, could cause a 'massive shift' in US employment patterns
as companies replace full-time workers with part-timers and
free-lancers." (Pat's Healthy Gripe, Michael Kramer, Time 1/31/94)

"For a man who has watched two years' work go down the drain in about
48 hours, Ira Magaziner, the architect of Bill Clinton's health care
reform plan, had a strangely delighted air at the White House senior
staff meeting last Thursday morning. The afternoon before the Business
Roundtable, a group of corporate executives, had supported the
alternative plan drafted by Congressman Jim Cooper of Tennessee. In a
few hours, the US Chamber of Commerce would use harsher language to
reject the Clinton approach. Earlier in the week, Clinton had offered
to trade away two key elements of Magaziner's design in order to win
support from Republican Governors. But through it all, Magaziner was
upbeat. Clinton, her reported with a tone of mock confidence, was at a
prayer breakfast across town with religious leaders. 'After 14 hours
of protracted negotiations,' he joked, 'Mother Teresa will not endorse
the Cooper bill.'" (Clinton's Plan: DOA? Michael Duffy, Time, 2/14/94)

"The letter from two Louisiana congressmen extended a 'special
invitation' to constituents for a conference on health care reform
that would provide an 'opportunity for public education and input.'
But the only thing public about the early January meeting chaired by
Reps. W.J. 'Billy' Tauzin (D) and Bob Livingston (R) was the building
that housed it. The event was financed by industries with a large
stake in health care reform. Industry officials dominated the podium
and panel. And the $25 cover charge for a weekday conference all but
assured an audience composed of those with a special interest in the
outcome. The meeting, like dozens of similar events held across the
country in the past year, was organized by former House members and
aides now working as conference planners. They enlist members of
Congress to head the meetings. The planners then line up sponsors,
select speakers, and write, print, and mail invitations from the
lawmakers. Although the arrangements comply with congressional ethics
rules, they show how special interests penetrate the traditional place
where lawmakers interact with their constituents. Members of Congress
take the public's pulse at such meetings and often refer to them in
justifying a vote... When the audience was polled at a February 14
forum chaired by Rep. Jim Bacchus (D-FL), two thirds of the attendees
identified themselves as health professionals, insurers, or business
leaders...At a forum in Nashville, the audience was so packed with
lobbying groups that the name tags were color-coded by industry."
(Health Care Forums Leave Public Aside, Michael Weisskopf, WP, 3/7/94)

"Requiring employers to pay 80% of workers' health insurance survived
its first test in Congress Tuesday in the initial votes on health
reform. If the legislative process is akin to making sausage, the
House Ways and Means health subcommittee's action signified the
grinding has begun. For President Clinton and his vision of health
care reform, it was not a pretty sight: Killer amendments from the
political left and right had to be deflected by a majority of the
11-member panel. And more will come as the process continues...The
most watched vote was on employer mandates, vehemently opposed by
small business as a threat to jobs and wages. It passed 6-5, with Rep.
Michael Andrews (D-TX), joining four Republicans in opposition...The
Jackson Hole Groups, the academics who kindled interest in 'managed
competition' as a way to hold down cost,..is backing down from its
support of employer mandates, suggesting the requirement be put on
hold until 2002"  (Health Care Employer Mandate, Survives First Test
in Congress, Richard Wolf, USA Today, 3/16/94)

"As the Democrats on the House Ways and Means health subcommittee met
privately last Friday to craft a health bill, Rep. Sander M. Levin
(D-MI) handed the chairman a list of questions he needed answered
before he could go along. All he wanted was a few studies on how
Chairman Fortney 'Pete' Stark's (D-CA) version of health reform would
affect the following: Businesses by firm size. Businesses by industry
type. Individuals by age. Families by size. Individuals and families
by income levels...'I said, 'Sandy, that would take us months,' Stark
said. So, with Stark trying to wrap up the bill in one week, Levin has
been left without answers...As the subcommittee debated amendment
after amendment in public, the real work of trolling for compromises
has been going on during 60 hours of closed-door sessions. 'What we
have is a five-legged stool and my job is to level the legs,' said
Stark." (Crucial House Battles on Health Care Are Closed- Door Events,
Dana Priest, Washington Post, 3/17/94) CURE Comment: Say, Pete, here's
a novel idea: Let Congress level with the American people for a change
and open the doors to the wheeling and dealing sealing our fate? After
all as Sandy said, "I wanted to know what we're doing before we did
it." CURE simply wants to know what you intend to do to us before you
do it.

"After two days of sweetness and light, things got nasty yesterday in
the House Ways and Means health subcommittee. Chairman Fortney 'Pete'
Stark (D-CA), irked by criticisms of provisions of his health reform
proposal, lit out after Rep. Nancy Johnson (R-CT), in classic
sharp-tongued Stark style. 'The gentlelady got her medical degree
through pillow talk,' he said. By contrast, 'the gentleman from
Washington'--referring to Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA), a physician who
favors many of Stark's ideas, 'got his through going to school.'...A
half-hour later, after a break in the session, he said, "I apologize
to Mrs. Johnson for personal characterizations that were not in order
at a markup.'" (Is There a Doctor in the House? Spencer Rich,
Washington Post, 3/17/94)

"If you wanted to foil the Clinton plan for universal health care,
where would you start? You'd spook the public with ghost stories,
hoping to scare them away from reform. That's what's happening now as
rumor-mongers in fright wigs sponsor TV ads and make the rounds of
op-ed pages. If you get enough voters to back away, health care
reform--if it passes at all--will reflect the interests of the
medical-industrial complex, not yours. Doctors and health insurance
execs, along with their political action committees, invested $8.3
million in Congress during the first 10 months of 1993, up 22% from
1991, reports Citizen Action. The drumbeat of disinformation has been
pounding away...Clinton's plan can't pass as written: there are
serious questions of cost and reach. But tinkering just preserves the
status quo, which is what the critics in fright wigs want." (Health
Reform: The Missing Story, Jane Quinn, op-ed, Newsweek, 3/21/94)

"'Louise' Rodham Clinton was aghast. Did you know, she asked concerned
husband 'Harry' Clinton, that under the administration health care
plan 'we could get sick?' It gets worse, the first lady told the
president in a video spoof of the 'Harry and Louise' television ads
being run by opponents of the Clintons' health reform proposals. It
says on page 27,655 of the plan that 'eventually we are all going to
die,' she said. 'There's got to be a better way,' the Clintons intoned
in mock solemnity. The Clinton video [closing with the words 'Paid for
by the Coalition to Scare Your Pants Off'] was a surprise hit Saturday
night at the 109th annual Gridiron Club dinner at which journalists
and the nation's elite join in an evening of gentle fun-poking."
(President and First Lady Give, Take Jabs at Gridiron Dinner,
Martinsburg Journal, 3/21/94)

"The hard part of health care reform is not how to get universal
coverage but how to achieve cost containment...The problem is not just
political--having to say to people that they may have to make do with
less--but structural. How to do it? That's the problem: how to set up
as system powerful enough to work without involving the government,
which would be the source of the power, more than almost anyone would
like in intimate health care decisions...President Clinton accepted
the notion in his health care plan that cost containment requires the
federal government to play a major role...The government would impose
premium caps ...to control the amount of money going into the system."
(The Hard Part of Health Reform, editorial, Washington Post, 3/21/94)
CURE Comment: What is a "political" problem for the White House and
Congress is a survival problem for the families we counsel. The myopic
debate between the right and left over who will ration life-saving
medical care: big business or big government begs the question: who
will be the victims of this checkbook euthanasia? The "little guy"
CURE is honored to defend.

"If President Clinton did not have health care reform as a daily
subplot in the Whitewater melodrama, he would really be emersed in a
sea of troubles. Health care is the issue that drives his
administration, gives it purpose, and, at the end of the day, may
provide a legislative triumph shortly before the November
congressional elections...Think of what Mr. Clinton's plight would be
if he did not have such a diversion from Whitewater. His foreign
policy is going about as smoothly as a frothing mountain
stream...Welfare reform, supposedly next in line after health care, is
a warmed-over Republican issue that could split the Democrats
ideologically. Truly, without health care, this presidency would be in
search of a mission. The George Bush question--just why did he want to
be president except for the honor of it--would be resurrected.
Although the Clinton health care plan is currently losing favor with a
confused public,... health care promoters have shelved the wonky idea
of promoting a grassroots movement behind an issue that gets more
confounding the more you know about it. Instead they plan a TV blitz
based on campaign-style polling. Health care's unforeseen role is to
keep Whitewater from grabbing all the headlines." (It's Health Care,
Stupid, editorial, Baltimore Sun, 3/22/94) ABLEnews Editor's Note:
Whatever your views on the diverse, often complex, issues impacting
health care, we hope our ABLEnews forum--in which your participation
is welcome--may transcend the 30-second sound bites of sundry special
interests--pro and con--to address the needs and concerns of Americans
with disabilities.

                        Heart Stoppers

"The last line of defense falls to bartender James Cunningham. Drawing
pints of ale as coastal winds whip and swirl across the barren downs
outside, he keeps an eye on strangers in his cliffside pub, especially
those who eschew the bar stools or fireside to sit alone in the
corner. The jumpers tend to sit in corners, he's noticed, steeling
themselves with one last drink. If he spots a 'suspicious one,' he
will try a little friendly bar talk, he says. But if his instincts
tell him that he's not getting through, he calls the police. Since
autumn, he has 'saved one,' as he put it, but two others have gone
over the edge." (White Cliffs Become Prime Suicide Site, Steve Coll,
Washington Post, 3/7/94)

"Blood tests found no insecticide or abnormal blood levels in the
system of a woman who died as mysterious fumes felled emergency room
workers, the Riverside (CA) Press Enterprise reported Wednesday.
Investigators now want to examine the syringe used to draw blood from
the dying woman at Riverside General Hospital on February
19th...Results of the blood analysis leave investigators baffled about
what caused the death of cancer patient Gloria Ramirez, 31, and caused
six hospital workers to become ill while trying to save
her...Investigators believe a toxic chemical caused the emergency room
team to become ill, but the source and type of chemical is still a
mystery...Investigators will now focus on emergency room items that
have been stored in sealed drums since the incident...'That syringe is
very important to the investigation,' the paper quoted a source as
saying. 'Without it there are certain things you can't rule out.'
Investigators also will test medications taken from Ramirez's
residence after her death to determine if there was product
tampering." (Fumes at Woman's Death Not Caused by Insecticide, MJ, 3/17/94)

"Former Nazi collaborator Paul Touvier entered a prison Wednesday, a
day before he becomes the first Frenchman to go on trial for crimes
against humanity...Other Frenchmen who collaborated with the Nazis
during World War II were tried and executed for treason, but none for
crimes against humanity arising from French complicity in roundups and
deportations of Jews. Touvier, whose case has been the subject of
voluminous news coverage in France, served as the information chief
for the collaborationist Vichy regime's militia in the Lyon area,
working closely with the Gestapo. He is charged with complicity for
his role in the killings of seven Jews in June 1944...[National Front]
leader Jean-Marie Le Pen said Wednesday that the trial was
unnecessary...'I find it sad that 50 years after the war, we are not
capable if pardoning the former German adversary,' Le Pen told Radio
Monte Carlo. 'France has enough other problems without worrying about
the details of its past.'...Le Pen won 14.6 percent of the votes in
the 1988 presidential election and plans to run again next years. His
reaction to the Touvier trial recalled a 1987 remark...when he
referred to the Nazi gas chambers as a 'detail of history.'" (On Eve
of Vichy Trial Accused Frenchman Jailed, Martinsburg Journal, 3/17/94
ABLEnews Editor's Note: A Harris poll reports that one in three French
citizens--like Le Pen--deem the trials of collaborators and Nazis "not
useful," but as Santayana--and life--remind us, he who forgets the
lessons of history soon relives them.

"To some, [the trial of 78-year-old Paul Touvier] means that France
will finally come to grips with one of the darkest periods in its
recent history; to others it means that the cover-up and denial
continues. Technically the trial concerns the killing of seven Jews
lined up and shot on Paul Touvier's orders...But the testimony...will
provide an unprecedented forum for exploring the extent of French
collaboration that sent nearly 75,000 French and foreign Jews to their
deaths...Touvier was a key aide to Gestapo police chief Klaus Barbie,
the 'Butcher of Lyon,' the only person already brought to trial in
France for crimes against humanity. ...Sentenced to life imprisonment
in 1987, he died in a jail cell of cancer in 1991. 'Barbie was tried
in Lyon,' [84-year-old prosecution lawyer Joseph] Nordmann said. 'But
the crime of a Frenchman is no less punishable than a German's, quite
the contrary.' Many thought this day of reckoning...would never come.
In the 1980s, three other aging Frenchmen were charged with crimes
against humanity for deporting Jews to Nazi death camps. But endless
delays in all four cases suggest strong official resistance to
reopening France's wartime past. Of the Frenchmen, Touvier was easily
the least important. The other three cases involved influential
figures in the Vichy regime--Rene Bousquet, who served as Vichy's
police chief between 1942 and 1944: Jean Leguay, who acted as chief
delegate in the occupied territories; and Maurice Papon, who was a
senior official in wartime Bordeaux. ...'Don't ask me about Touvier,
because he doesn't interest me,' said Henri Amouroux, a prominent
French historian. 'Touvier was a miserable secondary figure. Ask me
why Rene Bousquet [killed by a gunman last June] was never brought to
trial. He had protection. Ask me why there will be not trial of Papon,
either. It's the same story.'" (First Frenchman on Trial for Crime
Linked to Nazis, Baltimore Sun, 3/17/94)

"In World War II remembrance, the US likes to think of itself as
liberators, champions of freedom. How, then, to reconcile this image
with the shameful and largely unacknowledged chapter of the nation's
slow response to the Nazi genocide of Jews--an episode The American
Experience [PBS] series brings to light in a devastating account of
'calculated bureaucratic delay' and 'deliberate obstruction of
rescue.' America and the Holocaust-- Deceit and Indifference,
powerfully assembled by Martin Ostrow, ...has elements of suspense,
tragedy, and an indelible history lesson...Watch, remember, and
mourn." (A Painful Reminder of US Indifference, Matt Roush, USA Today,
4/6/94)

                        Lights, Cameras, Action

The family of the late Geoffrey Bowers, a lawyer who successfully sued
the firm that fired him when he contracted AIDS, is suing Tri-Star
Pictures, director Jonathan Demme, producer Scott Rudin, and others
associated with the movie "Philadelphia." Daniel Felber, an attorney
representing the Bowers family, said Geoffrey's mother and brothers
had shared their memories with the understanding that they would be
paid and that Geoffrey would be cited in the credits. "We made the
mistake of trusting people," lamented Dana Bowers, one of the
brothers. "They betrayed us." (Family Says 'Philadelphia' Story
Stolen, Martinsburg Journal, 2/2/94)

"Artistic license allows you to fudge the facts for the sake of your
art. A medical license allows you to practice medicine. What happens
when they meet? You get movies in which medicine plays a starring role
or serves as a plot device, sometimes with great accuracy, other times
with only accidental resemblance to what really goes on in the
hospital. Medicine is understandably an intriguing subject for
filmmakers...The Academy Awards over the years have rewarded medical
themes: Movies such as 'Rain Man' (autism) and 'One Flew Over the
Cuckoo's Nest' (inside a mental hospital) have won best picture
Oscars. Daniel Day-Lewis won in 1989 for playing a cerebral palsy
victim in 'My Left Foot'; Marlee Matlin won in 1986 for her portrayal
of a deaf woman in 'Children of a Lesser God.' (Dressed Up or Messed
Up, Disease Gets Top Billing at the Movies This Year, Jean Marbella,
Baltimore Sun, 3/21/94)

"Even doctors don't expect total medical verite when they go to the
movies. But, by serving as medical consultants to filmmakers, they can
prescribe a dose of fact to an otherwise fictional account. Directors
occasionally will ask doctors to review scripts for comment--leaving
open the option of ignoring it, of course--and invite them on the set
for any questions that may arise as the cameras roll. 'We agreed to
disagree on some scenes. I would say it doesn't happen that way, they
would listen, but not change it,' says Dr. Julian Falutz, an AIDS
specialist who advised the makers of 'Philadelphia.'" (Physicians Add
a Dose of Reality, Jean Marbella, Baltimore Sun, 3/21/94)

                        Medicaid/care

"A Medicare patient in Illinois who seeks a chest x-ray to look for
lung cancer is 500 times more likely to have payment denied as 'not
medically necessary' than a Medicare patient in South Carolina.
according to a new federal study. Similar payment discrepancies exist
for other treatments across the country, Rep. Ron Wyden (D-OR) said
yesterday. Wyden said a General Accounting Office study of Medicare
payment practice...found 'radical disparities in the claims approval
and denial rates' for Medicare nationwide. "Medicare coverage should
not be based on where seniors live but instead, on their medical
needs,' Wyden said." (Medicare Denials Vary Widely, GAO Says, Spencer
Rich, Washington Post, 3/29/94)

                        Mental Health Memo

"In the 19th-century painting, French doctor Fillip Panel is shown
breaking the chains encircling mentally ill patients at a French
institution called Salpetriere, freeing them at last from their dank
dungeons; before the work done by Panel and a handful of other
compassionate theoreticians, those with mental disorders were seen as
morally weak, possessed by demons, even contagious. ...Some brain
researchers, like Dr. Stuart C. Yudofsky of Baylor College of Medicine
in Houston, draw a comparison between the mentally ill of Panel time
and present-day sufferers from a variety of ills--alcoholism,
substance abuse, aggression, and anti-social behaviors. Such people
are viewed as morally weak, lazy, criminal, and even evil. The
researchers predict that in years to come, through the illumination of
brain science, the biological basis of many of these ills will be
revealed. They say it will be the modern-day equivalent of Panel
unlocking the neck collars at Salpetriere and no less controversial."
(Understanding the Brain's Role in Aggressive Behavior, Melissa
Stoeltje, Baltimore Sun, 3/22/94)

"The Supreme Court yesterday allowed states to prohibit defendants
from claiming they were insane at the time they committed their crime.
The court, without comment from the justices, let stand a ruling from
the Montana Supreme Court that said abolishing the insanity defense
does not violate the Constitution. While the court's order does not
apply beyond the individual case, other states could follow Montana's
lead...The insanity defense, adopted from centuries-old English law,
arose from the notion that some people are so mentally diseased or
unable to understand their actions that it is unfair to hold them
responsible for criminal behavior. While the defense is rarely
invoked, it has arisen in numerous high-profile trials... Currently,
only Montana, Idaho, and Utah bar the insanity defense...After
Hinckley's acquital [on charges of shooting President Reagan in 1981],
several states passed legislation restricting the defense by raising
the burden of proof for a defendant who claims insanity, or allowing
juries to find someone insane but still guilty and eligible for
prison...[University of Virginia law professor Richard Bonnie} said
that the states that have rejected the abolition of the insanity
defense have done so not out of constitutional concerns, but rather
'people's view that it would be morally wrong' to eliminate the
defense. Georgetown University law professor Heathcote Woolsey
Wales... said, 'I think it's important for the integrity [of the
criminal justice system} that you have a mark separating crimina;
responsibility and nonresponsibility." (Insanity Defense: Not a Right,
Joan Biskupic, Washington Post, 3/29/94)

                        No Place Like Home

Having overspent its budget for services to homeless people by as much
as $4 million in past years, the District of Columbia is warning city
shelter operators and other service providers to expect less city
funding next year. Advocates for DC's homeless say the amount budget
by the District is inadequate to maintain current services and
jeopardizes the $20-million DC Homeless Initiative to be funded by the
Department of Housing and Urban Development. "The District must
maintain the level of services which were in place last year, or
increase them, but they can't decrease it," cautions HUD Assistant
Secretary Andrew Cuomo. "It would violate the agreement. That could be
grounds for forfeiture." But Enid Simmons, DC director of policy and
evaluation, who oversees the initiative for the city claims, "Having
beds cut doesn't necessarily mean a diminishing of services."
(Homeless to Feel the Pinch, DeNeen Brown, Washington Post, 3/17/94)
ABLEnews Editor's Note: Gee, Enid, who writes your material? The
health care reformers?

                        Now Hear This

"A deaf Stafford County (VA) teenager will ask a federal court judge
to force the county's public school system to pay for a speech
interpreter at his private Christian school. If Matthew Goodall, 17,
wins his lawsuit, school systems across the state could be asked to
provide special education services in private schools...attorneys
representing the Stafford County School Board say...Matthew became
deaf after contracting childhood meningitis at age 3 1/2...Stafford
school officials say they are willing to pay for a speech interpreter;
but only if Matthew enrolls in a public school...The Goodalls argue in
the lawsuit filed September 23 that the public school system, by
refusing to pay for the interpreter, is violating their freedom to
practice their religion. 'In sending Matthew to Fredericksburg
Christian School based on religious beliefs, they are exercising three
constitutionally protected rights: free exercise of religion, the
right of parents to direct the religious upbringing of their children,
and the right of parents to direct the education of their children,'
said Matthew's father, Robert Goodall, a lawyer, in court papers."
(Deaf Child in Court Seeking Aid, Kristan Metzler, WT, 3/29/94)

                        Old Story

"Among the emblems of old age, a woman's curved spine is one of the
most powerful and haunting, at once both metaphor and augury. It
conjures up the crush of life's passage. More terrible, it often
heralds its end. For the humped back is often the most visible sign of
osteoporosis, a progressive disease that leaves bones thin and
brittle. Even so simple a motion as walking or sitting can collapse
vertebrae and fracture waists and hips. Those who suffer such breaks
rarely recover mobility. Many wind up in nursing homes. One-quarter
die within six months of a hip fracture." (Why the Bones Break,
Anastasia Toufexis, Time, 1/31/94)

"We got what we expected. We don't yet have a figure on how many
deaths there were, but the type of virus that was predominant...
usually has a higher attack rate in elderly populations and is
associated with more deaths. If there normally are 20,000 deaths in
the average flue season, we're probably looking at 30,000 deaths or
more from this one." --Joseph Breese, MD, medical epidemiologist,
influenza section, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 90% of
flu-related deaths involve victims 65 or older. (Fears of Awful Flu
Season Among Elderly Come True, Joyce Price, Washington Times, 4/4/94)

                        Public Health

"Immunization levels of 2-year-olds in our cities are unacceptably
low," charges Elizabeth Zell, immunization statistics chief for the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "We have a problem with
access in both urban and rural areas," adds Dr. Jay Berkelhamer, a
spokesman for the American Academy of Pediatrics. According to a study
of children entering school during the 1990 and 1991 academic years,
only 44% had been fully vaccinated by their second birthday--with
rates ranging from 58% (Boston) to just 11% (Houston). In 1983, public
health officials recommended children receive 10 doses, comprising
seven vaccines, before they reach school age. Today they advise 17
doses incorporating nine vaccines. (Study: Fewer Than Half of Urban
Babies Properly Immunized, Martinsburg Journal, 3/16/94)

                        Research Review

"The headline--"Scientists Discover Gene That Causes Disease'-- seems
like the payoff in a pulp novel, when the detectives finally track
down a killer and flush him from his lair. But while the denouement of
a murder mystery briskly ties up all the loose ends, genetic research
is another thing entirely. The public may expect that a discovery
means a new test, treatment, or cure is imminent--and sometimes, it
is. But sometimes the trail is long and challenging. Nothing
illustrates that better than what researchers face in exploiting three
major gene discoveries announced in 1993: those involving colon
cancer, Lou Gehrig's disease, and Huntington's disease." (Finding
Disease Carrier Only First Step in Developing a Cure, MJ, 2/22/94)

When Dr. William Summerlin reported in 1973 he had successfully
grafted skin from one kind of mouse to another at the Memorial- Sloan
Kettering Cancer Center, the news made medical headlines. Summerlin's
finding offered the potential of significant advancement in the
treatment of burn patients, among others. But a year later, when
scientists discovered the researcher had used a felt tip pen on the
mice to fake the results, different and less promising headlines
resulted. As Dr. Richard Horton, North American editor of the medical
journal The Lancet, reminds us, "Scientific research is based on trust
and integrity. It's very easy to abuse both of those." And very
difficult to catch. "If the frauder is very skillful and produces
credible lies, it's very difficult to identify it," warns the editor
of the Journal of the American Medical Association, Dr. George
Lundberg. Since June 1992, over 300 allegations of scientific fraud
have been registered with federal officials, a statistic National
Institutes of Health director Harold Varmus decries as "extremely
unfortunate" in what he calls biology's "Golden Age." (Science Only as
Strong as Its Integrity, Doug Levy, USA Today, 3/16/94)

Researchers are seeking to discover what factors trigger Alzheimer's,
how to prevent it, and how to treat it. The progressive disease
affects 4 million Americans. A study reported in the April 6 Journal
of the American Medical Association found more highly educated persons
or who worked in professional or managerial positions were half as
likely to develop dementia as those who did not attend high school or
worked in less intellectually challenging jobs. "If a person has a
higher education, it doesn't affect the course of the disease. But if
you have a greater reserve, it takes a much greater effect of
Alzheimer's disease to have an impact." --Dr. Robert Katzman,
University of California, San Diego. (Alzheimer's Puzzle: Cause and
Cure Elude Researchers, Doug Levy, USA Today, 4/6/94)

                            This DOES Compute

"A year-old computer network has become the communications backbone of
Germany's neo-Nazi scene, with users sharing ideas on how to rid
Germany of foreigners, coordinate illegal rallies, and swap
bomb-making recipes. The 'Thule Network,' guarded by passwords and
loyalty tests, consists of at least a dozen bulletin boards in three
western states...The network's name derives from the small, elite
1920s movement considered the Nazi vanguard...It is a place where
Russian ultranationalist Vladimir Zhironovsky is commended as a 'Robin
Hood' who wants to protect the downtrodden and keep both Germany and
Russia ethnically pure...The network is also a refuge--where a crowd
closely watched by police can disappear into cyberspace.
Technologically ahead of most police, network gatekeepers are having
considerable success keeping out the law. Not a single one has been
prosecuted...The Munich-based computer magazine Chip...estimates 1,500
of Germany's more than 40,000 right-wing extremists are active on the
network. They also say its operators are seeking links with US
comrades, such as Nebraska neo-Nazi Gary Lauck, who ships hate
literature to Germany...The heads of the bulletin boards, "Germania,"
"Elias,' and 'The Empire,' say on introductory screens loaded with
German flags and iron crosses that theirs is a network of
'nonconformists' who oppose 'the spirit of the times.' They post
slogans such as 'Give Peace a Chance' on their sign-off screens and
include disclaimers denying any intention to violate the law."
(Neo-Nazi Activities High- Tech, Martinsburg Journal, 2/2/94)

"The speed with which America's communications industries are moving
to develop the global telecommunications networks of the future has
left government policy-makers eating dust. The daring, high-wire,
technological plans unveiled in recent weeks are not only visionary
and breathtaking in their scope, they are going to shape the future of
global economics and communications for decades to come...The story is
moving so rapidly that it is light years ahead of what any of the
politicians and bureaucrats have been saying, even thinking...If
America is to maintain its leadership position in global
communications, we need a deregulatory policy that lets the
telecommunications industries move ahead with all deliberate speed.
This is not a business for bureaucrats still selling yesterday's
technology." (Info Superhighway Fast Lanes, Donald Lambro, op-ed,
Washington Times, 4/4/94)

                        Word of Life

"They are praying for a miracle. In a seventh-floor corner-room at
Beth Israel Medical Center is a 91-year-old man who has suffered his
second stroke in two years and is now tethered to a respirator. Across
the street in Stuyvesant Park, are several hundred men dressed in
black hats, black coats, and black shoes. Nearly all have thick beards
and carry leather-bound prayer books. They follow an Orthodox Jewish
tradition of prayer...They come to pray. They come to honor their
leader--whose 92nd birthday is tomorrow--by writing the final 92
letters in a newly inscribed Torah. They come to celebrate the life of
Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, the ailing man, they simply call the
Rebbe, a title of affection, respect, and awe." CURE Comment: Note the
classic TAB propaganda: "tethered to a respirator." The patient who
needs the breathing assistance of a ventilator is not "tethered to a
respirator"--any more than I am tied to the tie that hangs around my
neck. It is the man, not the machine, that is the irreplaceable center
to which life lines flow. We join the Lubavitch Hasidim and all who
love life in praying for Rabbi Schneerson. (Ill 'Messiah's' Flock
Prays for Miracle, Bill Glauber, Baltimore Sun, 3/22/94)

"President Clinton retreated into the final refuge of scoundrels last
week: religion. He talked about his faith with ABC News. On the
subject of God, the president spoke the way he does about health care
Whitewater. He takes a thread of fact and creates a tapestry of
obfuscation...Why didn't President Clinton's remarks about God disturb
the theological police at the American Civil Liberties Union? Where
were those vigilant guardians of church- state separation and those
who spoke against 'civil religion' during the Reagan-Bush
years?...Bill Clinton is beginning to resemble Jimmy Swaggart and some
of the other corrupt TV evangelists of the 1980s. He preaches one
message, while living another." (Clinton's Reach for Religious Refuge,
Cal Thomas, op-ed, Washington Times, 3/31/94)

"While homosexual activists protested outside the National Shrine of
the Immaculate Conception, Cardinal James Hickey in his Easter sermon
called on Catholics to work toward a 'moral resurrection.' 'How
critically our society needs a resurrection--a moral resurrection,'
the archbishop told about 3,000 worshippers at the noon Mass at the
shrine. 'God calls us all to be saints.'...The president and his
family attended Foundry United Methodist Church downtown where AID
protestor Luke Sissyfag disrupted the Easter service when he shouted
from the church balcony, 'Save your prayers for Bill Clinton.'...Mr.
Sissyfag also shouted, 'Where's the Manhattan Project...for AIDS?'
referring to Mr. Clinton's campaign promise to mount a federal AIDS
program of that magnitude...Secret Service agent Dave Adams said Mr.
Sissyfag agreed to go eith agents to be questioned." (Cardinal Seeks
'Moral Resurrection,' Adrianne Flynn and James Clardy, WT, 4/4/94)

                        Telling Headlines

Abortion Shooting Trial Begins Jury Selection, BS, 3/22
Admitted SS Guard Returns to Germany, Martinsburg Journal, 3/31
Are Men Really That Bad? Time, 2/14
Battlelines Drawn for Population Debate, Washington Times, 4/4
Caperton Health Plan Not Likely to Pass, Martinsburg Journal, 2/7
Certain Sex Practices Pose More Risk, Washington Times, 4/4
Clinton Eyes Gambling Tax to Pay for Welfare Reform, BS, 3/22
Cost of Dying Skyrockets in Post-Communist Russia, WT, 3/29
Dole: Health Care Plan Will Take Shape by Spring, MJ, 2/14
Father Indicted in Twin Toddlers' Deaths, MJ, 2/2
Foster Suicide Ruling Is Reopened, Washington Post, 3/3
Gay Groups Try to Distance Themselves From Pedophiles, MJ, 2/14
Germans to Avoid D-Day Fete, Washington Post, 3/10
'God Told Me to Kill' Case Goes to Jury, Martinsburg Journal, 2/2
Idaho Man Lives With Dead Mom for Years, Martinsburg Journal, 3/6
Maryland Snares Two Huge FDA Projects, Washington Post, 3/16
Nazi Sympathizer Will Stand Trial in Chicago, MJ, 3/6
Registering (Beer) Kegs Wins Maryland Support, WP, 3/17
Somalia Cholera Epidemic Has Death Toll Mounting, MJ, 3/17
Suburban Maryland Expects a Boom from FDA Consolidation, WP, 3/17
US Probes Whether Tobacco Concerns Agreed Not to Sell 'Fire-Safe'
 Cigarettes, Wall Street Journal, 3/8
Whipping Penalty Judged Too Harsh--By Some, USA Today, 3/10
Young People Likely to Be Without Health Insurance, WT, 3/29

                        Wish We'd Said That...

     You know what a miracle is? It is interference from
     God. (Yossi Pam, 19)

                        ...Glad We Didn't

     Manhood is the paradigm of injustice. Refusing to
     believe in manhood is the hot big bang of human
     freedom. (John Stoltenberg)


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