10A
Thursday, December 7,1995
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Pregnancy is likely in 6 days each month
Study suggests daily sex increases chances
The Associated Press
BOSTON — A myth-quashing new study pinpoints nature's window of fertility. Every menstrual month has six days in which a woman can set pregnant.
The findings have implications for couples striving to have children, as well as for those who want to avoid them. Still, it offers no sure-fire formula for people who want children.
"The trick to all this is for couples to know their fertile days," said Allen J. Wilcox, who was in charge of the study. "There is no good way to do that."
Perhaps the best advice is to have sex
Until now, estimates of women's fertility ranged from two days in a menstrual cycle to 10 or more.
often.
But the study found that conception is possible if a woman has intercourse on the five days before ovulation as well as on the day her ovaries release a new egg.
The often-repeated idea that couples should save up and have intercourse on the day closest to ovulation turns out to be false.
Sex before that six-day period almost certainly will not result in pregnancy. And to the researchers' surprise, intercourse just one day after ovulation won't, either.
Wilcox said the study suggested that the chance of pregnancy was higher with increased frequency of intercourse.
Ideally, a couple would want to know five days in advance when ovulation will occur and have sex on those days. Test kits now on
However, couples can keep track of ovulation over several months to help estimate when it will occur. This way, they can guess when the fertile six days will start.
the market will reveal when ovulation is occurring, but by then it's almost too late.
Moreover, test kit information is useful for those who want to prevent pregnancy without using other forms of birth control. Once the test shows ovulation has occurred, sex is unlikely to result in pregnancy, although they need to resume abstinence when the six fertile days roll around again.
"One reasonable caution is to say there may be a very small probability of conception on the day before and the day after that six-day window," Wilcox said. "We can't rule that out. If you are trying to avoid pregnancy, you might reasonably want to add a buffer onto both sides of that window."
And timing clearly is not everything.
"Even couples who are very fertile are not fertile in every cycle," Wilcox said. Wilcox and colleagues from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in Research Triangle Park, N.C., published their findings in last Thursday's issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
Wilcox, who also teaches at the University of North Carolina, based his findings on 221 women who wanted to get pregnant. All stopped using birth control, collected daily urine specimens and kept records of when they had intercourse. From this, the researchers calculated when the women ovulated and when they got pregnant.
The probability of conception ranges from 10 percent when intercourse occurs five days before ovulation to 33 percent when it happens on the day of ovulation itself. Daily intercourse results in the highest chance of pregnancy — 37 percent.
However, about one-third of all pregnancies end in miscarriage, so the probability of actually having a baby is lower. In a typical month, the researchers figure, there is a 10 percent chance of successful pregnancy if couples have intercourse once a week. With sex every other day, it is 22 percent. With daily intercourse, it is 25 percent.
Among other findings of the study:
- Contrary to another common belief, no evidence exists that the timing of intercourse affects the baby's sex.
Sperm has a fairly short shelf life. Ninety-four percent of pregnancies result from sperm that has lingered less than three days. No pregnancies were from sperm more than five days old.
No sign was found that aging sperm are more likely to produce babies with defects, although the study was too small to prove this conclusively.
Peacekeepers set up Bosnian headquarters
The Associated Press
TUZLA, Bosnia-Herzegovina — the first U.S. Air Force cargo plane arrived at this northern Bosnia air base yesterday, carrying communications gear and technicians in preparation for a massive operation to supply the American military headquarters in Bosnia.
Forty-five more officers and soldiers from NATO countries — nearly half of them American — flew into Zagreb, Croatia, in a heavy snowfall to set up a temporary office that will be the main operating center for the 60,000-strong NATO peace mission.
Adm. Leighton Smith of the United States, commander of NATO's southern European headquarters, will run the office that will enforce the peace agreement initialed last month in Dayton, Ohio.
The C-130 Hercules that landed in Tuzla carried 12 U.S. Air Force personnel. With the addition of troops from the 86th Airtlift Wing, 30 American military personnel now are in Bosnia.
Also on board was cargo including lighting and communications equipment to refit the airport at Tuzla. About 20,000 troops eventually will patrol the northeast sector of the country.
"Our job is to make the army successful," Col. Neal Patton, vice commander of the 16th Air Force in Aviano, Italy, said in a telephone interview. "Our measure of success is their success."
One challenge will be moving aircraft around on the ground in a
Patton said he was surprised to find the base in good shape. "There hadn't been a lot of maintenance done to it, but it hadn't been torn up either."
How U.S. troops will get to Bosnia 20,000 U.S. ground troops and their equipment will be transported from Germany by air, rail and truck to northeastern Bosnia. How it will happen:
Patton will command 300 U.S. Air Force personnel who will refit the air base in Tuzla and control the movement of aircraft, expected to reach 20 to 30 flights a day.
By train About 400 train loads of troops and equipment go from Germany to Hungary, taking a total of 40 to 60 days.
Bad Kreuznach
By truck
By truck
At Kaposvar, troops, equipment are driven across eastern Croatia into Bosnia.
Prague
tight space surrounded by mines.
"The mine status around the airfield is unknown," Patton said. "It's kind of in a swamp. And a lot of the area that is clear of mines is in low terrain."
Briefing reporters on his findings after a reconnaissance mission around Tuzla, U.S. Brig. Gen. Stan Cherrie said what has been obvious to those who spend time there. "It is a very, very fragile infrastructure, roads in particular. ... The terrain is very rugged."
Much road work needs to be done, he said.
Tanks, fighter jets and countless support vehicles will start rumbling into Bosnia within a day or
two of the peace treaty signing Dec. 14 in Paris by Serb, Croatian and Bosnian minister Cherrie said.
The first two British Royal Air Force C-130s landed shortly after noon. One carried two Land Rovers with trailers and four British soldiers, the other two Land Rovers and six soldiers.
In Sarajevo, the U.N. and NATO airlift resumed yesterday afternoon after being suspended for several hours by heavy snow.
Also yesterday, a 13-vehicle convoy, carrying mainly office equipment, left NATO's southern Europe headquarters in Naples, Italy, for Zagreb. The drive was expected to take about four days.
Man charged in Rabin assassination
Jewish activist says he did it to stop accord
The Associated Press
TEL AVIV, Israel — Yitzhak Rabin's confessed killer flashed a "V" for victory sign yesterday on his way into a courtroom in which court officials formally read the murder and conspiracy charges against him.
"Yigal Amir is accused of the gravest crime, murder, and the victim was the prime minister," Prosecutor Pnina Guy told the Tel Aviv district court.
Amir, who could life in prison if convicted, smiled and nodded.
A judge said Amir's trial would begin Dec. 19, six weeks after the fervently religious 25-year-old law student shot Rabin at a peace rally.
Amir says he killed Rabin to prevent the implementation of the Israel-al-PLO peace agreements, which transferred to the Palestinians parts of the biblical land of Israel.
But his defense attorney, Mordechal Offi. said he hadn't
decided yet how his client would plead. Even if Amir pleads guilty, there will be a trial.
If convicted, Amir's mandatory sentence is life in prison for the murder, and he faces up to 49 years more for weapons and other charges. The death penalty in Israel is reserved for Nazi war criminals and offenders who harm state security, such as spies.
Amir did not speak to reporters as he was brought into court yesterday, wearing a gray sweatshirt and black skullcap.
Guy said the prosecution planned to present as evidence his confession, ballistics tests and a reconstruction of the Nov. 4 shooting.
Amir also is represented by attorney Jonathan Goldberg, who immigrated from the United States seven years ago from Houston, Texas, and lives in the West Bank settlement of Emanuel.
Goldberg, who has defended Jewish militants in the past, told reporters Amir's attitude in court was a reflection of his good nature.
According to the indictment submitted Tuesday, Amir decided to kill Rabin some amir after the first
Israel-PLO accord was signed in 1993. He recruited his 27-year-old brother Hagai and friend Dror Adami to help him.
The court ordered the two suspected accomplices held through Jan. 7. They were charged Tuesday with conspiracy and weapons violations in the assassination.
When they first hatched their plans, the Amir brothers and Adani considered blowing up Rabin's car or firing an antitank rocket into his apartment, the charge sheet said. In the end, Yigal Amir decided to kill Rabin with his 9mm Beretta pistol.
Between January and September of this year, Amir tried and failed on three occasions to approach and shoot Rabin.
On Nov. 4, Amir told Hagai he would try to shoot Rabin at the Tel Aviv rally, the charges said; Hagai tried to dissuade him, arguing heavy security there would make escape difficult. But Yigal Amir went ahead with his plan.
The Amir brothers and Adani also were charged in a separate indictment with setting up an underground group that planned to attack Palestinians in the West Bank.
Station reveals traffic-stopping promotion
The stunt backed up traffic on Interstate 435, which encircles the Kansas City area, for a mile about 7:20 a.m. Tuesday. Angry commuters called the Kansas Highway Patrol to complain, and the bathing beauty and her driver were issued tickets.
OVERLAND PARK — A radio station promotion that put a bikini-clad woman next to a highway during morning rush hour didn't turn out to be such a good idea.
Amy Crawford, 22, of Kansas City, the woman who halted traffic
"It's a cute prank and all that...but it's a potentially serious situation."
Ray Balliff Overland Park patrol sergeant
from atop station KBEQ-FM's van, was arrested for failure to appear on a previous traffic charge. She was released after posting $125 bond.
on the interstate.
Crawford and an assistant station producer also were cited for being pedestrians on the highway, and the assistant producer was cited for parking illegally
"These disturbances cause problems," said patrol Sgt. Ray Balliff. "It was a cute prank and all that, and I'm sure it could be great for ratings, but it's potentially a serious situation."
The assistant producer, Jim Bone, said his radio station wanted to celebrate the Chiefs' winning the AFC West and thought motorists would just honk as they sped by. "We didn't really see anything wrong with it," he said. "Nobody else was really doing anything else to celebrate the Chiefs."
In one past promotion by the same radio station's morning show, a station van ran over a woman's leg while the station threw cash to a crowd. In another, an unsuspecting Johnson County store was mobbed by people who had been promised tickets to a nonexistent concert.
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