HEALTH/FITNESS UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Wednesday, June 18, 1997
7
AIDS program aimed at city youth
Free HIV tests, condoms,facts offered to poor
The Associated Press
NEWARK, N.J. — Christopher Blount is no stranger to the perils of AIDS.
He has known three people who have died of it. He works for a program that sends a mobile home into Newark's housing projects and other communities to offer literature, condoms and free HIV testing. He gets tested regularly.
Blount is 17 – too young to vote, too young to drink, too young to buy tennis tickets. But he isn't too young to get AIDS. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention figure people under 25 account for as many as half the estimated 40,000 to 80,000 new HIV cases each year
— despite all of the prevention
messages.
Part of the problem, medical experts and young people say, is the natural inclination of young people to believe in their invincibility.
"There are too many kids that are hardheaded, nonchalant," Blount said. "They're not willing to accept what's on you."
And they say that while the message is out there, it's not being taught well enough to reach those who need to hear it.
"Prevention can work, but we don't have the will, fiscally and politically, to do what it takes. The prevention messages we have are ineffective," said Robert Johnson, physician and director of the division at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey that runs the mobile testing program.
A White House report in March said that although most school systems provide some AIDS education, many prohibit discussion of sexual intercourse, homosexuality and condom use.
Workers in the New Jersey mobile
testing program hand out condoms and try to educate young people, although Johnson says he focuses on testing for those at risk.
The Newark metropolitan area has the seventh-highest AIDS rate in the country, with 73.9 new cases per 100,000 people in 1996, according to Center for Disease Control figures. The national average is 34.1 cases per 100,000 people.
"We have to find the kids who are infected and treat them," Johnson said. "If a kid is sexually active, get him tested. That is sound from a health point of view."
There are no firm figures for AIDS cases among Newark teens, but Johnson estimates there are between 800 and 1,000 HIV-positive teenagers in the city.
Mustafa Harper, a 19-year-old worker in Johnson's program, said it's easier to persuade people his own age to get tested than to preach to them.
But director James Anderson said that by using teen-agers to speak to teen-agers, the 9-month-old program has had some success in getting young people to think about safe sex.
"There are too many kids who are hard-headed, nonchalant. They're not willing to accept what's going on"
Christopher Blount AIDS educator
"You're looking at someone who looks like you, who's involved with the same stuff. You think, 'Maybe there's some validity to this,'" Anderson said.
Hantavirus spread by human contact
Rodent feces originally thought to be the cause
The Associated Press
Scientists previously thought hantavirus could sicken people only if they inhaled microscopic bits of rodent droppings.
No cases of person-to-person transmission have been documented in the United States, where the viral strain that causes respiratory illness was first identified in 1993.
ATLANTA — A hantavirus outbreak killed 11 people and sickened nine others in Argentina last year in the first known case in which the respiratory illness spread from person to person, U.S. health officials said.
There are dozens of strains throughout the world, but none until now have shown they could spread from person to person, said
Hantaviruses are a family of viruses named for the Hantaan River in Korea, where the first strain was discovered.
C. J. Peters, chief of the special pathogens branch at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The hantavirus strain contained in rodent feces first emerged when it killed dozens of people in the Four Corners region, where Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah meet.
In the coastal towns of El Bolson, Bariloche and Esquel in southern Argentina, 18 people got sick between September and December with hardly any rodents around. In addition, two more people who had contact with El Bolson residents but never went there became ill.
Since then, hantavirus has sickened 162 people in 27 states, killing 76, the CDC said.
The CDC has kept close tabs on U.S. health care workers since the disease first emerged. None have contracted the virus.
The respiratory illness starts out with flu-like symptoms that worsen and can become deadly. The lungs drown in fluid and the heart slows down, sending patients into shock. About half of people infected with hantavirus die. There is no treatment.
HEALTH BRIEFS
WASHINGTON — The companies behind three popular types of exercise equipment have settled deceptive advertising charges by the Federal Trade Commission.
The settlement announced yesterday prohibits Abflex, U.S.A. Inc., Life Fitness, and Icon Health and Fitness Inc. from misrepresenting any weight loss resulting from the use of their products. It also requires competent and reliable evidence for claims about the exercise equipment.
A settlement also was reached with Kent & Spiegel Direct Inc., which produces infomercials, print and television advertisements for Aflex.
The FTC targeted Abflex because of ads claiming that users of its abdominal exerciser could lose weight and inches by using the product three minutes a day. The commission focused on ads for Icon's stationary bicycle and Life Fitness' motorized treadmill that say users could burn about 1,000 calories per hour.
NEW YORK — A woman who sprotroduced a beard after taking Rogaine is suing for $1.5 million. Gloria Mosesson, 73, is suing Pharmacia & Upjohn Inc., maker of Rogaine, claiming it caused "heavy, dark, beard-like growth on her face."
Pharmacia representative John Wayne said the instructions explain that unwanted hair can grow if the product is applied frequently to areas other than the scalp, but Mosesson's lawyer claims his client used the product correctly.
The Associated Press
Death redefined by Japanese law
The Associated Press
TOKYO — Japanese lawmakers rewrote the definition of death yesterday so that patients waiting for heart and lung transplants can get life-saving operations without having to go overseas.
Japan has been one of the few countries that does not recognize brain death, in which brain activity ceases but machines can keep other organs working. That made heart, lung and some other transplants impossible, though they are routine in the United States and elsewhere.
"The law is the first step toward the birth of a new kind of medicine
that requires the participation of the entire society, not just doctors and patients," said Kikuo Nomoto, a doctor and transplant advocate. "It's epoch-making for Japanese medicine."
But a lingering public distrust toward the medical establishment forced controversial provisions into the law, including the right of family members to reject a doctor's diagnosis of brain death.
Under the old law, death came when the heart stopped beating. At that point, corneas and kidneys still could be used for transplants, but the heart, lung and liver had deteriorated too much.
Emotional debate stalled the new
law for three years. On one side were hundreds of patients needing transplants and their doctors. On the other were skeptics who said entrusting doctors with determining the moment of death was too dangerous.
The main obstacle has been suspicion toward doctors. Japan's only heart transplant, which was in 1968, resulted in two criminal investigations against the chief surgeon.
The new law, which takes effect in three months, said that brain death would be recognized only in cases involving transplants.
The law also says transplantals will be allowed only from donors who
have left written consent. Brain-dead people who did not agree to transplants still would be considered alive and would continue to receive treatment.
"Although two people are in the exact same situation, there is a 180-degree difference between life or death," said Tadatoshi Akiba, a lawmaker who voted against the law.
Some critics said the law instituted a double standard.
Others said the law was too strict and it may lead to inheritance squabbles over the time of death. A group representing children with heart disease also criticized the law for not recognizing brain death in people under age 6.
NATURALWAY 820-822 Mass.841-0100
$1 OFF COUPON
K.U. STUDENTS ONLY
WORLD'S GREATEST
HAIRCUT
$795
reg.
$8.95
h coupon • Expires 09/23/07
$6.95
With coupon • Expires 09/30/97
--your dinner table.
REG. $45
HELENE CURTIS
PERMS
$2995
SNIP N' CLIP
FAMILY HAIRCUT SHOPS
ORCHARDS SHOPS
842-5151
(14th & Kasold)
Open Nights and Sundays — Just Drop In
COMPLETELY Long Hair Extra Open Nights and Sundays — Just Drop In!
Tuesday and Thursday afternoons 4:00 to 6:30pm Saturday mornings too...6:30 to 10:30am
花
Fresh locally produced edible-pod peas, onions, greens, broccoli, new potatoes, cut flowers, home baked breads, honey, jams, goat cheese, strawberries, and desserts for
Stop by on your way home.
Between 10th and 11th on Vermont Street... at the bottom of the hill.
SPORTING GOODSTENT SALE!
Checkers parking lot 23rd & Louisiana
Apparel, shoes, hats & ball gloves
Sat. June 21st 9-6,
Sun. June 22nd 11-5
Everything at or below cost!
Nike t-shirts $10 or 2 for $15
Hats starting at $5 - tons to choose from major league, college, etc.
Shorts $5 to $10
Shoes - many starting at $20 Nike, Adidas, Fila and more!
Rawlings Ball gloves $20 $30 $40 huge selection
NIKE,ADIDAS,VANS,SIMPLE RAWLINGS,THE GAME,STARTER RUSSELL ATHLETIC,FILA & MORE!
1016 Massachusetts Downtown Lawrence 865-4055
Mondays - $2 Pitchers / Live Music / Free Pool
Tuesdays - $2 Big Draws
Wednesdays - $1.50 Anything
Thursdays - $2 Any Draw
Friday Nights - $2.00 Any Bottle
Saturday Nights - $1.50 Domestic Bottles
Now Serving Pyramid Pizza!
Come In For A Slice! Open For Lunch!